Cosmetic Fetters
by lovebugga
Summary: In addition to his catalyzing gymnast career, he fancied pissing his too self-reliant makeup artist off. It's not like she could go anywhere; she was indentured by legal contract and vanity. Kind of like him.
1. Meager Parts

**Chapter 1**

He didn't twirl. He didn't swivel nor revolve. His pride was too great to participate in these exuberant, parading acts of "dancing". He kept his movements fluid and elegant, paired with graceful flips and back handsprings. Gymnastic dancing was fine art, you just had to have the technique as a counterpart. And he did, indeed, have this counterpart.

 _Flexibility is principal,_ Sasuke thought as he vaulted into a front tuck and stuck the landing with a full right split.

 _Agility, too._ He sprung into a front tuck again from his seated position, grabbed a gymnasium bar with one hand while pulling himself up with his opposing arm, and poised atop it. He looked below him and saw his juvenile self looking up at him with those ebony eyes. His face was full of mirth that present day Sasuke envied. He looked back to his position on the bar and again was faced with his former apparition. The mirth in his face had inched away, present but slowly vanishing. He deviated from his path and turned around, only to come face to face with an older wistful personage.

 _Can't forget speed._ Sasuke ascended to the topmost gymnasium bar with cutthroat alacrity. He then looked down and the boy was not there. In his place was a voracious crowd, beastly in their cheers. He simpered.

It seemed that the higher he scaled, the more success he would have, and the more the crowd would encourage. He rose to the very tips of his toes, lifted his chin up, and gave an appearance that emanated aristocracy. He indulged the audience with a perfect walking handstand, allowing their hungry eyes access to his well-built, slender torso when his shirt fell to his chest. They shouted as he hand stood on the edge of the bar.

 _And the ever present showstopper._ Sasuke tilted over the edge. His legs threatened to capsize him and bring him down to the mats 15 feet below. It appeared silent besides some music for the moment and he took this time to completely straighten his legs as they came down. He bent his knees so that his feet could touch his back thighs. Propping himself up on only one finger, he lingered on the fringe for a scarce few seconds more.

He bent his finger which bounced him up momentarily. He stole this extra second in the air and implemented 3 hasty turntables, 2 straight leg back tucks, and 1 air handspring, grounding with the same one fingered position he took on the apex bar.

The music was cut off and cued Sasuke's performance as over. He accorded the howling audience with another small simper and bow.

He lived for the acclaim. He didn't seek validation from it but considered it dignifying because it semaphored his physical prowess, and it felt good to him. He didn't seek validation from anyone. He was his own person, and the public was his pet that he would walk and pet. They worshiped him like a deity and he ate up every second of it. Something was missing, though. Sasuke had been heavyhearted for a while. He locked up this little secret behind his flair and only let it out in private.

Ushered off the stage by black and navy blue clad security, the teenager glided into the locker room and was accosted by a handful of his team. His team consisted of childhood friends and one family member; however, some were acquaintances he didn't much care for.

The former was composed of Gaara, Suigetsu, and his brother Itachi. The latter consisted of Neji Hyuga and Deidara.

He couldn't really explain why he didn't care for Neji. Sasuke would've pondered the idea of being his friend once upon a time because of Neji's silent nature and proficiency. But something about him rubbed him wrong and Sasuke didn't give it much thought anymore. It was something about his eyes, maybe. But he was a damn good dancer. He didn't have anything against the guy and preferred to steer clear from him when he could. Deidara, however...

The blonde scourge was loud, obnoxious, and too much of a try hard concerning art. In addition to that, he had an annoying habit of repeating certain words at the end of almost every sentence. He was intolerable at the very least.

"Good job out there," Suigetsu said and a myriad of razors poked out of his maw. He clapped Sasuke on the back and almost knocked him over.

"You need to eat more though," he continued, seeing his back pat nearly send Sasuke flat on his face.

"He needs to eat less," Gaara voiced quietly. "The county competition is coming soon. Which means we'll need to slash water weight and generalized unnecessary weight." Sasuke nodded and Suigetsu gnashed his teeth. Suigetsu loved food and hated anything that forced him to cut down on it.

"Anyways," Neji said, "Good performance out there. I couldn't have done it better. Your denouement was phenomenal." Sasuke internally gritted his teeth. If he could place his finger on his uncanny dislike of the teenager, he would, and rebuke it. There was a good chance it was his eyes.

Sasuke only really cared about his brother's plaudit, and even then it was only a little bit, because Itachi trained him and chaperoned him to prestige. Deidara and Suigetsu praised him after Neji and Sasuke drowned them out. He was waiting for Itachi to voice his opinion on his display. Itachi opened his mouth only to be cut off by Deidara.

"Oh yeah, we forgot to tell you this Sasuke, yeah," the blonde said, "we fired our new team of makeup artists, uhn. They didn't do a very good job, right? I mean look at you, yeah. Look at that smudgy eye liner on his right eye, Neji." The rest of the team leaned in to see the supposed defect. Neji slightly nodded. Sasuke pushed his hair out of his faced and sighed lightly, walking to the wall mirror to observe said eyeliner mishap.

"I agree that they could've done a better job, but where are we going to get 5 exceptional makeup artists in time for the competition?"

Deidara grinned. "I have a team ready for us tonight, yeah," he said. "They're bringing their equipment and meeting us at our apartment. What time is it, uhn?"

"It's about 8," Itachi said quietly.

"Let's go, then, yeah. They said they'll be there at 9."

Sasuke coasted back from the mirror with the eyeliner smudge on his hand. He didn't really need nor want any makeup artists; he let his performance speak for itself. But if Deidara and the others insisted, Sasuke was forced to oblige. Deidara was always picky about his appearance being as pristine as possible, even outside of the stage. If Deidara were to have an artist, he would want to have the best one, and Sasuke tacitly acquiesced with him.

Gaara asked if he could ride with him and Sasuke accepted. Itachi took the rest of them in his car. Itachi's car was a 2017 cherry red convertible Ferrari, a California T model. Sasuke never liked convertibles, nor did he like the sun. It would be understandable that Itachi wouldn't like them either seeing as how they were basically identical in features and skin pigment. However, he did not. He usually left his top down. Sasuke never asked.

Sasuke's car had tinted windows as dark as the legal limit would allow. He put his hand on the handle as Gaara walked around to the other side. They opened the doors and Sasuke put his keys into the ignition. His vehicle thrummed to life. He pulled out of his parking spot. He spotted his older brother in the rear view mirror trailing behind him. He could see Deidara's now ponytail-less form standing in the back with his hands up. Sasuke gritted mentally again.

The Uchiha's parents awarded them both cars for placing first in a tournament when Sasuke was 15 and Itachi 19. It pained the prior to see Deidara acting like a clown in the back in his parent's car.

Sasuke's car drove like he walked; polished and effortless. He absentmindedly patted the leather steering wheel in the midst of pulling onto the highway. In what seemed like a few minutes, he and Gaara soon arrived at their complex. Sasuke got out and looked for Itachi's car. It wasn't there. They must've stopped for something on the way home. He turned around and was startled with a vision of bright pink hair mixed in with a few less tedious hair colors. Deidara's new makeup team just walked out of their own cars. Sasuke glanced over at his red headed friend.

Gaara looked a little stunned too. But Sasuke didn't think it was for the same reason as his. He traced Gaara's gaze back to a simple looking girl with very short, light brown hair. Perhaps an ex or an old friend. However. Sasuke didn't really think that Gaara was capable of relationships if he was being blunt. He studied the girl a little more and turned back around when he heard Itachi's car purr towards the lot. Itachi parked and Deidara bounded out of the back seat with Neji following.

With all of them together again, Sasuke could finally evaluate their face painters closer without interruptions. He was drawn, but more forced, to look at the shock of pink. She looked dignified without the ridiculous colored hair. Her makeup was nice looking from afar, her lips painted with a wine color. But if Sasuke was given the choice to choose another, he would. He didn't like unnatural hair colors. The other girls were decent looking, but at least some had prettier and longer hair.

Itachi reared up next to Sasuke. "We had to stop for gas," he said. Itachi noticed the pink color too. It looked as if he were recollecting the owner. Itachi beckoned for his team to follow him to greet their new lineup.

Sasuke walked with Itachi, and watched as he extended his hand to each member of the team introducing himself separately, flashing exclusive charming smiles. His brother really had a way with people, not just women in particular. When he reached the pink head, he smiled the brightest of all. "Hello, Ms. Haruno," he said pleasantly. She hadn't even said her name, so it was obvious the two had a friendly connection.

"Itachi, long time no see!" She contradicted his handshake with a hug. He smiled softer this time and returned it with one of his own. They parted and she took a hold of his face with both hands, examining it. Gaara nudged Sasuke easily and gave him a look that seemed to ask him what this connection was. Sasuke shrugged and wondered himself.

"My, my, you've grown a lot haven't you?" she said teasingly, alluding to maybe an inside joke between Itachi and her the way she had said it. "No more 'chubby cheeks and huge eyes,' huh?"

"I could say the same thing. You always steal my words; I've bet you've built an empire on them seeing as you're here working for us now. That, and Deidara contacted you. It's not easy finding me, you know." He ruffled her hair and she laughed and smoothed it out. "This is my brother, Sasuke. He's your age."

She turned towards Sasuke and elongated her arm for him to shake her hand. "I'm Sakura. Your brother used to be my babysitter."

 _Ah, I see._ Sasuke took her hand and was surprised with how warm and small it was. It was a huge contrast with the nippy fall air swirling about. She turned back towards Itachi and allowed her team to get familiarized with them. Sasuke went through the motions and was well aware of the yearning way the girls looked at him when they shook his hand. He returned none.

Neji's sister was in there as well. They looked nothing alike apart from their pupil-less, lavender eyes. Gaara's ex girlfriend was present too; the light brown haired girl. Her name was Matsuri. They all walked back inside the complex, with a few straggling behind.

Sasuke straggled behind for a reason. He couldn't combat the compulsion to look at Itachi's old friend's legs as she walked beside his brother. They were the longest out of all of them, curving at the right places. But maybe they weren't the longest. Her 5 inch heels gave the impression of extensive calves and thigh.

They all walked back inside the complex. Sasuke tumbled onto the large beanbag in the corner of the room. He leaned back into his arms. He closed his eyes and almost drifted off to sleep while everyone talked. He was tired from his lengthy rendition and accommodated his sore limbs with repose.

Sasuke didn't fancy conversation, so he sanctioned that role to his team. He drifted further into the sweet embrace of slumber while people exchanged words with each other regarding expectations.

He cracked an eye only to the sound of his name.

"You get first pick, little brother. It's only fair," Itachi said. "Who do you want to work for you?"

Sasuke scanned the group. Before being told to pick, he was mulling over one particular girl. She sported a long, blonde ponytail and had blue eyes. But she was the one who looked starstruck the most. Now that he thought about it, that girl with the pink hair was the only one who didn't appear to be heart-stricken after shaking his hand. He threw around the idea of the blonde girl once more again. If she really admired his looks, she wouldn't butcher them then, right?

But his trained eye couldn't disregard a few flaws in her presentation. Her eye liner was a bit off. And the pink head's was impeccable.

"I'll take the pink headed one," Sasuke affirmed. He closed his eyes again. The aforementioned girl looked at him and practically radiated. But, he missed Itachi's mildly dismayed look. The remaining team members chose subsequently.

Sasuke was with Sakura, Neji with Hinata, Gaara (unfortunately, or fortunately, but probably fortunately because he chose her himself,) with Matsuri, Suigetsu with Karin, Deidara with Konan, and finally Itachi with Ino. It all seemed right and analogous. Everyone appeared to be happy, or at least content with their collaborator. All except one. Suigetsu plopped on the beanbag next to him.

"These girls sure are pretty, huh?" Suigetsu buzzed.

"Sure, Sui," Sasuke agreed with his eyes still closed. Suigetsu lamented over his friend's lack of hormones. "You've got the first hottest piece of ass in this joint now," Suigetsu continued. Sasuke resisted the urge to open his eyes at this admittance. Sasuke decided to indulge his friend in discussion.

"Oh yeah?" Sasuke inquired. Suigetsu always had an affinity for standout girls and outlandish hair color. His mouth's interior was decorated with shark's teeth and his own hair was light blue. Suigetsu grinned, turned, and pointed to the girl talking to Itachi.

"Look at the girl you picked. She's not common looking, y'know? She's got those good-looking green eyes and that vibrant hair. And that body, damn. She's got a dancer's body like us, but she's got assets, heh," he disclosed to Sasuke. "Wonder if she's a dancer or been one. Cause it certainly looks like it."

"Mm," Sasuke hummed. "I wonder why Itachi let you pick first," Suigetsu placed a finger on his chin and looked at the ceiling.

"It was probably because he didn't think I'd choose his previous 'client', if that's even what it was. Highly doubt it, though."

"I guess you paid attention to Itachi, huh Sas'," Suigetsu grinned. "I thought you were too busy sleeping. He had that possessive look in those eyes. Like when he looks at you sometimes. Brotherly pride. But it wasn't similar to the way he looks at you this time. It was a little... lewd. But who knows, I've never seen Itachi horny. I don't know if he's capable of feeling lust," Suigetsu continued. "Itachi looks a lil' bit pissed that you chose her."

"But seriously, the way he looked at her didn't lie. It was different this time. It wasn't cold, serious, or empty. There must be something about that girl he's not gonna tell us, because he wouldn't be this seemingly possessive about a girl who he claimed to only babysit years back."

Sasuke opened both of his eyes and made direct eye contact with his brother from across the room.

 _He definitely thought I would choose that blonde girl. He probably presumed that she was more my type, and that I could get laid easier because of her ditsy nature._

Sasuke smugly smiled and looked back at his friend. If Itachi and that girl wanted to presume that Sasuke was monopolizing her to spite Itachi, then they could go ahead. But Sasuke only wanted the best for him. And she did her makeup exceptionally. He still didn't even know her name though. He forgot. It wasn't important for him to know, though. She was such a meager part of his life now, and Sasuke was confused by the party like aura that radiated through their apartment room.

They were just makeup artists, and would be lucrative if successful. That's all there was to it. They would take around 30 minutes to complete their almost daily ritual on their partner's face and both would go their respective ways. Albeit Hinata and Neji, maybe. That's how it always was before them.

But yes, a very scant amount of their lives would be dedicated to them. That's what he told himself that night. The conversations around him were doused with dreams, and Sasuke was blind to Itachi's occasional glacial stare in his direction.

Suigetsu passed out next to him shortly after, he too now numb to the repartee flowing around him.

 _Author's Note: Hi guys! This is actually my first ff, so I'm a lil' unseasoned. But I hope ya'll enjoyed this, because it was fun writing. If there's support for the story, I'll be writing lots more, cuz I got a good idea where this fic will go. Feel free to point out any typos or any weird sentence structure stuffs. :-)_

 _Disclamier: I do not own Naruto or any of its' characters; in addition to that, I don't own my profile picture or cover image either. Some Xerxes Break fanart is my pfp and my cover image is made by hiroshin10. The link is_ _art/Makeup-SAKURA-HARUNO-596969436_

 _Give credit to each respective maker/artist. :))))_


	2. Cigarette Breath

**Chapter 2**

Sasuke awoke, startled into consciousness by a sound coming from the kitchen. He scrunched his eyes and tried to isolate Suigetsu's obnoxious sleep noises to home in on the noise that woke him up. His living room was too congested with blackness to see clearly and he rubbed his tired eyes with his fists and found the source. By the outline of her pink hair alone, roughly illuminated by the subdued kitchen light, he didn't have to look any further to determine it was his artist. She had tripped over something by the look on her face. Her blonde friend was there as well.

What he couldn't make out though was the hair that integrated with the darkness. Itachi was camouflaged besides her, talking quietly while looking straight ahead at the cupboard. When Sasuke heard the girls laugh softly he rolled over. Hinata was there as well, sleeping soundly on the love seat. Neji was transverse to her on the main couch. Suigetsu's, Deidara's, and Gaara's artists were elsewhere. He exhaled.

 _Why were they here?_ Sasuke closed his eyes again, but decided to venture out for a smoke because of his now alert mind not long after. He stretched his limbs before getting up. Suigetsu groaned, unfolded his body from that weird position he fell asleep in sometimes, and settled into a firm face plant into the beanbag with his arms to his side. His right knee bent upwards and his toes pointed straight upwards.

 _Christ._ Sasuke took his cigarettes out of his pocket; the red and white box was crushed, and a few of its brown contents were bent. He really needed to start putting them on the counter to avoid such travesties. The trio in the kitchen perceived the figure arising and one greeted him.

"Hello Sasuke," his brother said, "did we wake you?" Sasuke nodded and placed a stick leisurely in his mouth.

"I'm going outside."

"We're coming with you," Itachi said and observed Sasuke's mildly annoyed look directed towards Sakura and Ino, "if that's fine."

"Yeah," Sasuke complied. He walked to the door and left it open for them to follow him. Sakura went first, then Ino and Itachi. The prior reached into his jogger pocket for a lighter and lit the cigarette, admiring the black and cherry colored ashes take over the tip as white smoke eddied through the air. He leaned over the apartment banister on his elbows with Itachi and Ino. Ino coyly asked for Sasuke's lighter and a cigarette because she had 'forgotten hers at home'. Sasuke noticed that the pink haired girl wasn't there with them, and saw that she had deviated towards the wall via his peripheral. Sasuke handed her over one because he wanted to avoid her whining. She seemed like the whining type.

Sasuke was annoyingly barred between the two.

* * *

Sakura veered more towards the wall than towards them. She was a non-smoker, and resisted the urge to chastise Itachi and Ino, and Sasuke a little bit, when the exhaust made it's way in a hurling vortex towards her. When she had been talking with Itachi earlier she could smell the tobacco fumes on him and some of his friends. Especially his brother. Who she would be spending the most time with. If worse came to worse, she could always don a gas mask or hazard suit. She enjoyed the smell but her body health cognizance disagreed.

Ino didn't even smoke. Well, she was a social smoker. She was a sucker for guys who lit ones for some reason, though Sakura couldn't comprehend it. It was so bad for people. She couldn't count the number of times Ino had flirted using the same old kittenish shtick where she would bat her eyelashes, ask the man for his lighter and a cig because her pack was at home, and brush her hand incidentally over his when taking the lighter. Sakura also didn't know why Itachi and Sasuke indulged in the habit; they were excellent gymnasts from what she'd heard.

 _Whatever worked for them._ But she doubted they were at their peak performance because of it.

Sakura was more responsive in getting to brandish her cosmetology skills to Itachi's brother rather than flirt with them. From what Itachi had told her, his brother was really hard to please. He was a competitor after all, and had a dog-eat-dog attitude about him. If she wasn't anything but perfect he'd certainly let her know. But she thought she would excel so she dismissed any nervousness. Habituating her appliance of makeup kept her self-assured in her craft.

"Hey forehead," Ino turned and called from the banister, "when do you turn 18?" Sakura was snapped from her train of thought.

"March 28. Why?" Ino sighed, turned back around, and looked at the dissenting red leaves on the trees from below the banister.

"Itachi told me that Deidara invited us to a frat party at his college before he fell asleep. You just have to be 18. It'd be less of a hassle for us to wait for your birthday, but we can't. It's tomorrow night, so not an option. So, it looks like we'll have to use my forging skills. Or my charm," Ino tittered. Sakura rolled her eyes and bent her fingers to her palm, looking at her manicured nails.

"Pig, what makes you think I'm going to a party with people I barely know? I can smell the frat axe and Budweiser from here," Sakura waved the manicured hand in front of her nose, feigning the mentioned scent with a wry face.

"Don't tell me you're scared of a _good time,_ Forehead. You also get a chance to fraternize yourself with your college and classmates next year. It's Konoha Performing Arts. It'd be a waste if you didn't accept," Ino mewled and brought her cigarette to her pink lips. She puffed once, and let it blow a little too close to Sasuke. Sakura looked at Sasuke's arched back. His clavicles stabbed out dangerously.

"You're telling me the two things I mentioned are key components to a good time, huh? If that's your idea of a _good time,_ than I'll take a huge pass," Sakura said and denied her proposition for the second time. She heard a small chuckle from the older brother. The blonde girl scowled and went in for another drag, playfully noticing that she was down to the butt afterwards. She also playfully noticed that the Uchiha brothers had about 1/4 left of theirs.

Sakura rolled her eyes. This was another constituent to her skit. Ino would purposefully outsize a man's drags in an attempt to steal one or two puffs from him. Sakura wondered who Ino would opt for.

"Hey, Sasuke. You mind if I take a bit of yours? I'm all out," Ino asked him coyly. Sasuke sucked at the rest of his, threw it and stomped on it with his shoes, and walked past Sakura to the door and closed it. Ino sighed as Itachi handed her his.

"You're not wrong about Sasuke, Itachi; he's a bit of a hard ass. He'll wanna come to the party though, right?" Ino asked him. Itachi shrugged and walked to the wall to where Sakura was and crossed his sleeved arms.

"I'm not sure. He'll either want to get completely shit faced or stay at home, locked up in his room. He's never in the middle. He can't be assuaged and hates moderation. He can never have enough from whichever end of the spectrum he's on that day," Itachi looked at Sakura for the first time since they went outside. His inky eyes glowed a little in the AM moonlight as he made eye contact with her. Sakura offered him a smile and she crossed her arms too.

"So, good luck Sakura," the man relayed deeply. Sakura couldn't help but notice the marginally risqué way he relayed it to her. She blushed but shrugged it off and buried her nose into her scarlet scarf. Her nose was tinctured with a color not unlike her hair, due to the cutting edge of the cold air and partially because of Itachi's voice. Ino had noticed Itachi's tone in that sentence as well, Sakura judged by the way she looked at both of them.

"I think it's time for me to go home," Sakura said, looking at the 3 big numbers glowing on her phone screen. Itachi nodded and told her he'd walk her to her car once she got her things from inside. Ino frowned and looked at the clock on her phone as well. It was only 2:08 AM. She was hoping to spend the night with her pink haired best friend. Sakura and Itachi left Ino on the banister, pensively looking at the stick between her pointer and ring fingers.

Itachi closed the door behind her softly, making sure not to wake anyone in the living room. He didn't observed the glistening pair of black eyes by Suigetsu, watching him fixedly. Itachi tailgated Sakura, not bothering to make his obvious stare at her lightly swaying hips hidden. Sasuke lied there on his side and looked at the transaction between the two a little curiously. Sakura went to the marbled kitchen island and picked her keys up. She turned around and leaned on the island.

"Make sure Ino doesn't spend the night, no matter how much she begs. I don't want her busting a move on you or your brother or something. She's erratic when it comes to guys like you and him," Sakura said.

"Guys like us?" Itachi asked whimsically. "What do you mean by that?" Itachi walked a little bit closer towards her to hear her better.

"Your typical tall, dark, and handsome, Itachi. Don't try to play demure. You two are obviously good looking. I'm just going to leave it at that," Sakura affirmed. She walked a little closer to him as well so as to see him better. His somber hair and attire synthesized his body into the background of his kitchen.

"Is that a stereotype I hear?" Itachi asked. Sakura grinned and shrugged.

"It fits. No more ego stroking. I need to get home. I'm getting really lethargic," Sakura yawned and said, effectively closing their conversation. Itachi helped her put her bulky coat on.

"Before I go, I need to ask the schedule," she said.

"The county competition is closing in; we leave in two weeks. So we'll need you here everyday until then if you can come. 5 PM is a good time for Sasuke. He practices in the morning into the mid afternoon, mostly. We can be flexible if needed," Itachi said smoothly, as Sakura finished buttoning up her coat. She handed him her phone to put his number in so she could be updated if something came up. In turn, the older brother put Sasuke's in hers as well.

"Ino's number?" Itachi asked her. Sakura typed her blonde friend's characters in Itachi's phone and turned to the door.

They walked out and he held the door open for her. She ambled as softly as she could in her almost half foot heels.

Sakura's phone vibrated inside her woolen pocket. It was Ino saying she had left a few minutes ago and was headed home.

"Ino left, so luckily there'll be no unprofessional altercation between you two," Sakura said teasingly. Itachi's mouth turned upwards. They walked down the stone steps to her car. Sakura put her hand on the car handle and was surprised to meet another hand there as well. She raised her brows, looking up at Itachi's tall form questionably. He opened the door for her with her hand still bottoming his. She was a bit taken aback by his unusual brazen hand touch. His eyes softened as she looked at him for an explanation.

"The nostalgia is hitting me with full force," Itachi said quietly, "I really did miss you. You were my favorite kid. You've grown into a sightly young woman," he poked her with his index finger on her forehead, a common, affectionate trend throughout his teenagehood he bestowed on Sasuke and Sakura. Sakura was taken aback again.

"I remember your parents would drop you off at my house and you would have a handful of glitter eye shadows and neon yellow lipsticks. Who knew you would end up here in this merciless profession," Itachi said airily, tilting his forehead to rest on hers. Sakura flushed at the direct contact so close to her lips. No doubt Itachi was a velvety orator now. He was great with words during his teenage years, but she couldn't remember much about it since she was so juvenile.

"I know it's pitiless, but I'm here because I'm one of the best. And I won't back down, no matter how tough of a time your brother gives me," Sakura said to him. Her breath generated a puff of white in the air.

"We're giving you the contracts and liabilities tomorrow," Itachi said. His warm breath interwove with hers. He tilted his head back up and she went into her car.

"You're positive this is what you want? If you back out, there will be legal strains. Take tonight to mull over the conditions," Itachi said. His hand was now plastered near the roof, above her door. He leaned down again.

"I would understand if you back out, you know," Itachi said even softer. "Sasuke is petulant and high-strung. I don't want you, or anyone that I care for for that matter, to get trapped into this."

Sakura was perplexed to as why her childhood friend was fashioning his brother to be some sort of neurotic manic. He seemed stable from what she had seen, excluding the incident with Ino bothering him for a second time. He was a teenager and prone to be irate at times. She was too. Sasuke couldn't be anything she couldn't handle.

Sakura repeated her thoughts to him.

"Sasuke can't be anything I can't handle," Sakura told him with conviction in her voice. Itachi somewhat grimaced and relinquished his grip off of the car.

"Alright, Sakura. I believe you. Be safe driving home. I'll see you at 10 tomorrow, if you're still here. I won't be off practice until then," Itachi told her. Sakura smiled brightly, putting her keys in the ignition. Her fuzzy pink dice swung from the key chain.

"I'll be safe. See ya, 'tachi," and with that, she pulled the door closed.

* * *

Sakura stirred from beneath the covers. From what her alarm clock told her, it was 2:18 PM. She groaned and strew her arms across her stupified eyes. It was time to create her face for that day. She stirred again before pulling herself out of the thermal cradle of her sheets.

 _Not before making coffee, though._

She traipsed heavily across her woolly carpeted floor into her small kitchen, placed a coffee pot beneath the maker, and put a roasted filter above it. It eventuated into a caffeine saturated, full cup of demitasse in a few minutes. Sakura shouldered it into her bathroom after taking a weighty sip.

She looked into the tidy and well-kept expansion of glass in front of her. Her eyes opened a little wider when she saw the massive cowlick that had formed in her curly, bed-ridden head. After taming it with water she was ready to begin her grindstone. A myriad of maquillage laid atop the white counter beckoning to her capable hand. She singled out a a green tinted primer first and applied it all across her features; she put a bit more on the bridge of her nose and her dainty cheekbones where her contour would be placed later on in her routine.

Foundation and concealer came next. Her fair skin agreed with the ivory color she had used since her early teens. She picked up a semi-thick brush and swiped foundation across her small blemishes and red areas, then concealer.

 _Foundation can never go on top. To do so is to inevitably untidy the hues and create little powder specks,_ Sakura repeated the words of a cosmetology book she read a few months back. It was still in her room, systematized on her glass bookshelf in her living room.

After making sure her facial work was prim, she bronzed her lower cheeks which created a soft line towards the top and bottom of her lips. She mimicked the natural contours of her face with her bronzer, being sure to subtly blend the soft line the further it traveled towards her mouth. Sakura elected to not use blush; she didn't want to put too much emphasis on her shaped cheeks.

With a thin, powdery eyebrow pencil, she filled in her brows with a light pink. She didn't like doing her eye makeup prior to her eyebrows; a brimful, preened brow fabricated the arch where her eye shadow would fit better.

 _Now eye shadow. Then eyeliner. Thennnn falses. My poor tortured lashes never get a break. Should I do brown or red shadow?_

After she picked, a dark rouge pigment was apparent on the corner of her eyelids. It compounded breezily into a lighter color the closer it reached her inner brows. She dashed a thin line of black liquid eyeliner across its' respective place. Sakura tweezed one long false eyelash set and cleaved it to the dash. She did another one.

The girl took the coffee cup and held it with both palms, wrapping her cold fingers around the mug. She admired her work in the mirror; nothing was out of place. She savored the toasty liquid as it traveled down her throat, effectively anchoring at that specific place in the stomach where it warmed her core.

 _All we have is mineral powder to set it all, Sak'._

The mineral powder she had procured a few months back was unsurpassed by her standards. It left in its wake a thin, almost invisible coat of grains across her concealer to absorb the day's accumulated facial oils. She dusted the powder across her cheeks, forehead, the bridge of her nose, and chin via a large makeup brush.

She glanced around the wooden door frame to audit the time. It was 3:05 now. It wasn't her leading time, but it was still admirable. She swiveled back around to come face to face with her concocted image again. Sakura made the decision to straighten her thick, wavy, bed diseased hair. It reached the dawn of her collarbones rather than her shoulders.

She reached for a tube with a red and slanted tip protruding through the end. She mused over applying a lamination of lipstick and affirmed her answer when she puckered her ruby coated lips back and forth until the color was even and clean looking. She agreed with what the mirror showed her and was on her way out the door in a few minutes after she dressed herself, give or take.

With the dismissal of school for fall break, Sakura had nothing planned except training for her future profession. But when she got a call a few days ago from the man named Deidara she had never met before, her plans changed.

Actually, it gave her more professional conquests and practice. She now had the opportunity to work with a team of licensed gymnasts rather than her high school play candidates. It's not that the latter wasn't practice enough; it was vigorous and demanding work, but it was too junior for her level of skill. Once she had finished with her work, the absent-minded high schoolers would rub it off accidentally, spawning a mishmash of colors on their face that wasn't beautiful in her eyes anymore.

It was vexatious, really, how careless they were. She didn't want her work to result in a disastrous paint patchwork like it so often did. But for the time being she settled with it, figuring out new ways to adapt her makeup to the irritating rub of the teen's sleeve or bare skin. That was when she found the setting mineral powder.

So when the gymnast buzzed her one day from an unknown number that she had hesitated to answer, it was clear that the big leagues determined that she and her team were suitable for their taste. The pink headed girl recalled that the blonde one with the half ponytail was Deidara. But Deidara wasn't in charge of the group; her ex babysitter was. Her applicant, his younger brother, appeared to be second in command from what she had observed last night.

Sasuke Uchiha was your classic sulky teenager, sure, but he was a crackerjack with his talent. He had at least that in common with her. He played hard ball with his team even though he was years younger than some of them, which was her age. He might even be on par with Itachi; Sasuke walked with poise and allure unrivaled by his 3 teammates, excluding his brother. He had a body that was engraved by years and years of fierce flips and springs. It was uncanny the tangible similarities between the two.

She pulled her high school hoodie sleeves down past her wrists. The hawkish weather was drifting over into the next season much too quickly. She walked faster to her destination.

The destination was a local party-goer store, which was a walking distance from her apartment. Inside it contained colorful party favors, seasonal costumes, movie makeup, a myriad of different brands of alcohol, firecrackers, etc. It was the establishment every high schooler and typical early 20's adult went to for a kickback or show. The automated doors peeled themselves open for her and she made a bee line for the movie makeup section which was adjacent to the whiskey.

With her heels planted firmly in place, she surveyed the new druthers they had for her. Her right idex finger made its way to the bottom of her chin and bent while her left arm folded underneath its' partner. Sakura's scanning was discontinued when her ears descried a faintly familiar voice coming from the adjacent store section.

"It does matter what color it is. If it ain't red, it's dead," the voice declared. She silently laughed and poked her head around the corner. Sakura's eyes received the form of the wild looking, blue haired boy in Itachi's team and Sasuke. They didn't seem to notice her so she went about her business and ducked her head back into her respective branch.

"Whiskey is supposed to be amber. Do you know what color amber is?" Sasuke said. Sakura heard the blue head gnarr at the question.

"Ambers' like, I dunno. It's red though, right? Because whiskey is supposed to be red. The good kind, at least," he said. She could decipher Sasuke's sigh and probable eyebrow bridge pinch at his answer. Upon distinguishing footsteps towards the opposite direction, the doors, she peeked from the corner again. Sasuke was walking away from him.

"Sas', wait! What color is amber?" the boy yelled at his retreating form. Sasuke's clavicles still threateningly punched through his back, this time moving for her. They looked like unhealthy knives. Sasuke raised a hand up in adjournment of his inquiry and slid out the doors elegantly into the spacious parking lot. The boy still inside groaned but stopped when he saw the pink strands emerging from the makeup wall.

"Hey, you're Sasuke's artist, ain't ya?" the boy grinned at her widely, granting her an eyeful of his two rows of barbed teeth. She didn't flinch but was instead fascinated. She hadn't seen these when he shook her hand.

"The one and only Sakura Haruno, at your service," Sakura bowed for him funnily and his grin extended even wider.

"Cute with a witty sense of humor. Damn, Sasuke's gonna hate you," the boy told her. Sakura tipped her head strangely at his statement. If he genuinely thought those two things about her and thought Sasuke would as well, why would Itachi's brother not enjoy her company?

"Yep. He likes em' tall and long-haired, with a dumb personality to match. Anyways, I'm Suigetsu Hōzuki, also at your service. Whatcha gettin' here, sweet face?" Sakura pointed to the cosmetics wall behind them, and he nodded.

"Stage stuff? Is that what you and your team are gonna use on us?" Suigetsu asked her.

She smiled and shook her head. "No, we have characteristic stuff for you guys. I'm here for theater makeup for my high school, and overheard your impasse. Maybe I can help you," Sakura said.

"Ambers' the sticky stuff that hardens and insects get stuck in it sometimes. It's a tad darker than a sunshine yellow," Sakura told Suigetsu, and observed the whiskey lineups. "I think Sasuke might have wanted you to get this one. It's the most amber I could see," Sakura continued and transported to him a decanter with a clear space to inspect the color.

"Oh yeah, amber..." Suigetsu trailed off, undoubtedly still not familiar with the substance by his reaction. "Sure, I'll get this one. The red ones in here don't look that great, so yeah," he said and put his razors on display again.

"The new things in here don't look so great either," Sakura said and offered him a smile of her own. She paused.

"Wait, you're only 17. How're you going to buy that, anyways?"

"When you're a part of a team with Itachi and Sasuke, anything slides. The guy here knows my face," Suigetsu said slyly, and plucked the decanter out of her hand and a few more from the whiskey rows.

"You on your way to our apartment? It's almost 5, and Sasuke's prob' comin' to the party tonight that Deidara invited you to. So you got a little time window. Unless you wanna deviate from that no and give us a yes," Suigetsu said just as slyly. Sakura rolled her eyes and gave him the same explanation she had given Ino.

"Suffocation by axe is not the way I wanna go out in this life. I think I'll just convince one of you guys to stay home or one of my girls to practice on," Sakura said.

"Your loss," Suigetsu said, his voice feigning heartache. Rolling her eyes again, she made her way to the counter with him flanking.

"You never said if you were on your way. We could give you a ride. It's only 20 minutes, and we're headed over there anyways," Suigetsu offered. He deposited his bounteous 6 decanters on the counter and the cashier rang them up, asking no legal questions about his purchases.

Suigetsus' right. Being affiliated with his team does have its' perks. But alcohol isn't a very good perk for him. They have so many bad habits for gymnasts.

Sakura shook her head, declining his polite extension. She might've wanted to go home early or later, depending on if she needed a material she had forgotten or if she had finished early or later.

"I need to get my things prepared and in codification. I'll catch you though in an hour or so," Sakura said. Suigetsu feigned heartache again, even settling his palm across his heart and the back of his hand against his forehead.

"Fiiiiiiine. While you're doing that, mentally prepare yourself for Sasuke. His moods are inconsistent at best," Suigetsu warned, and parodied Itachi's words from the early morning unknowingly. "He also wants unparalleled skills if he's forced to have a makeup artist."

"I've heard, don't worry about little old me. See ya then," Sakura affirmed, and they walked out together, parting to their appropriate ways. They imparted a wave and smile to each other before revolving completely around.

 _Why is everyone typifying Sasuke as such an unmanageable, condemnatory teenager? Have they forgotten that I'm his age, and good at what I do, like him too?_

Sakura didn't discern Sasuke's condescending lower directed towards her from inside his car when he looked up from his phone screen.

 _Author's Note: I got people who really like the story, and I'm really happy they do. :-) Thanks to the guys who took the time to send me feedback; I rlly appreciate it lots. It's a huge stimulus to keep writing._


	3. Precision Into Perdition

**Chapter 3**

Sasuke opened the door to encounter his artisan on his doorstep. She sported a colossal, green backpack, the straps pulling tightly on her shoulders due to the excessive contents in it. He looked down at her expectantly. She smiled up at him lightly but it wasn't reciprocated. He conceded to her entrance and he closed the door behind her as she traipsed in with a certain confidence pulling at her posture. He didn't lock the door again.

He eyed the tiny, cursive, inscribed letters of the name "Sakura" on the bottom of her backpack, and foggily recollected her introducing herself as so yesterday. He stood in front of the door watching her.

He saw her lay the backpack's stuffing onto the glass coffee table in the middle of the living room. There were vibrant cylinders, compact mirrors, and pencils. She plucked up a waxen foundation from the titanic makeup hoard and glanced up at Sasuke to find him watching her nonchalantly, his hands plunged into his pockets.

"So, are we just gonna stand here all day, or are we gonna shit done?" Sakura quizzed, holding up the foundation.

"Your outfit doesn't match," Sasuke said candidly, motioning lazily towards her baby blue flats and light blue jeans, "that doesn't make for a good first impression on a gymnast."

"Good thing this isn't my first impression," Sakura quipped, "if you didn't remember, we had the pleasure of meeting yesterday."

"First impression is business related," Sasuke said to her a matter of factly, "you can't just show up to my apartment, wanting to work on my face, in clashing attire."

"I'm your makeup artist, not your fashion designer, pretty boy. You should've picked Ino if you were looking for both," Sakura said.

"I expect first-rate in both fields. She was deficit in the makeup one," Sasuke stated. He wasn't giving her a compliment; it was his way of saying that she was the most passable but still lacking out of her 5 team members. He saw Sakura scowl at him, obviously not amused by their tennis playing type of conversation, but she still beckoned for him to come over and sit on his leather couch with her hand. He sat a few feet away from her, and she scowled again and shifted towards him. She asked him to turn sideways so he could face towards her. She held the foundation palette up to his cheeks and forehead.

"I need to see if I have your exact skin shade. Your skin is really fair, so I might need to create a compound with ivory and something else," Sakura told him. She moved the palette around his face, testing both colors correlations with each other. Upon reaching Sasuke's black eyes, he heard her draw in a breath sharper than the ones she drew before. She moved the foundation a little slower down the expanse of his eyes.

"There's such a big color counteraction between your skin and eyes it's uncanny. There's no other tone to your skin besides blanched and no other tone to your eyes besides jet black. It's just completely unalloyed," Sakura said a little breathlessly, obviously in awe at this anomaly. Sasuke saw her eyes burnish, saturated with ideas. She dropped the foundation to her knee and now scanned his face with the concealer. Sasuke remained silent as she observed him more. He now looked straight ahead as he was prodded.

"I have this color in the bottom of my pack called 'pearly' that I've never used before. Let me see if that matches more prominently," Sakura said, "it should look great with fair skin and dark, dark hair." She started to delve into that cavern that she called a backpack. Sasuke broke his quietude.

"How could you not have anticipated that my skin isn't suitable for common colors?" Sasuke asked her impatiently. Sakura didn't look up at him as she kept digging.

"I kind of used Itachi's skin as a base for yours, because I hadn't gotten the chance to fully examine you up close that well. His skins is way more peachy than yours," Sasuke saw Sakura extract a spotless, seemingly unused box from her pack. It had the word "pearly" imprinted on it, the letters shimmering in the light. Sasuke sneered at her for paralleling himself and his brother.

"You should really foresee these things before you waste my time excavating that backpack," Sasuke said and leaned to the right on the couch, situating his clothed right leg underneath his left one. Sakura furrowed her brows, not giving Sasuke a retort. She seemed way too centralized on the task at hand to acknowledge his small jab. After she took the insides out of their box, she dislodged the compact mirror from the palette.

"Seeing as how I'm probably never going to use this shade on anyone but you, I don't need this mirror," he saw her toss it to the side. Bringing up a broad brush to whisk the contents up into it, Sakura swept it across his face, the first brush to contact his face today. It tickled his skin, but he was used to it. She stopped mid-brush and looked into his eyes.

"You've washed your face today, right?" the artist asked him. He rolled his eyes and dismissed her question with a wave of a hand, not bothering to give her a yes or no. She brought the brush back down to her lap and her eyes seemed to boil.

"Listen, Uchiha," Sakura began, "Deidara, or rather you in that case, made it my personal mission to carry out this task with the utmost refinement. I won't be impeded by my client's pompous, smart-ass attitude. Especially when he's the one who chose me." Sakura said, her voice remaining steady but her eyes still boiling.

"So if you want the finest, and I'm oh so regularly told you do, you'll answer me with at least the decency of an affirmation or not," Sakura ended. Sasuke's eyes never switched their color like hers did when her emotions flipped; they remained vacant, and a little bit entertained. It looks like his makeup virtuoso wasn't afraid of engaging in a little toe-to-toe with him.

"And what makes you think you're tops? One of my dim-witted teammates phones you up, and suddenly you're ace?" Sasuke asked her, slinging his arm over the edge of the couch. "Just because I chose you doesn't mean that I think you're amazing," he progressed. "You just seem to be the best out of a measly 5 players. Yes, I do want the finest, but please don't think that you're that."The boil in Sakura's eyes never slackened throughout his speech.

"I can prove to you that I'm one of the best, if not the best. And if you're not placated, I'll be on my way, and will line up one of my acquaintances for you," Sakura bristled. Sasuke's lips turned up a little bit to one side, a pathetic substitute for a would-be beautiful smile, full of stainless white teeth. Sasuke peered at the microwave clock from behind her pink head.

"So what are you waiting for? You have 1 and a half hours until I leave with Suigetsu."

* * *

Sakura didn't falter. She swept up the pearly foundation and swiftly got to work on his upper cheekbones, the area that she would magnetize the most attention to. She grazed Sasuke's nose bridge after dipping the brush into more snowy substance. She concluded her infrastructure with more light brushes to his chin and forehead.

"Keep your eyes open in your customary 1/4-lidded position," she instructed her model. "If I can't see what you'll actually look like when I've finished, it won't look like how I want." Sakura mandated. Sasuke minded her, partially because he was intrigued by her confidence and partially because he wanted to see her fail after many minutes spent slaving over his face so arduously. His lids coated his eyes as per her instruction.

She grabbed a matching pearly concealer and dolloped a few small spots with it, most noticeably the vicinity around his eyes to make them pop out with the addition of more white. Sakura wielded the foundation brush once more and inter-fused the dollops in three meticulous lines from under both eyes, nose bridge, and upper lip section, making a Y with it. She caressed the concealer dots into their personal zones, contriving a comely evanescence of striking white to softer white the further it progressed into his cheeks and below his nose.

Sasuke's facial skin responded well to the brand of makeup and the color she utilized. Now, she had to test the waters with the pigment of bronzer she regularly used, and was wearing now. She opted for a lighter, more gold tinted bronzer. A darker bronzer would design a strident line against his pale skin. She didn't want to divert unwanted attention to his already contoured cheeks with a harsh, unnatural line; she wanted to make his cheekbones and cheeks the centerpiece, because they were alluringly high and sharp.

"1 hour," Sasuke said, snatching her mind from her thoughts. Sakura nodded. She outlined two delicate, golden brown lines on either side of his nose and harmonized them together to structure a soft aristocratic polish. She finished the contour with a slow, tactful dusting motion towards the corner of his lips. It was the best contour she had done on anyone else. She mutely cheered.

She glanced down at the coffee table and homed in on a pastel pink blush container which was separated from every other makeup content on the table, and looked back up towards Sasuke hopefully. The boys she had worked on were always against any sort of pink whatsoever complimenting their face. Sasuke shook his head and she lamented for the handsome blush that would not be present.

"Come on," Sakura implored, trying to appeal to his senses, "it would add a three-dimensional element to your face. It's just a dash of pink."

"I loathe pink," Sasuke said, and unambiguously directed his eyes to her hair. She looked daggers at him and ousted her suggestion of the blush.

"Your best friend seems to think different," Sakura said coolly and picked an eyebrow pencil up to begin a feathery course through the sharp arches of his black brows. Sasuke rolled his eyes in a very teenage-esque way, mildly entertained at her droll comebacks and her impedance to back down at his snide jeering. She was lively in her speech and her craft; Sasuke was face-to-face with her's now as her pencil curved about his eyebrows, and her face was constantly modifying its' expressions based on her happiness with what she had done.

"Suigetsu isn't my best friend," Sasuke said bluntly, "and he's a dumbass." Sakura pressed the pencil harder into his brows, flicking it quickly up to where it bowed downwards and finished it at the crisp edge near his temples.

"Lot of talk for someone you're waiting specifically for to go to a party with," Sakura placed the pencil on the table and selected a sandy eye shadow where she hastily applied it on the corners of his eyelids with a thin brush and blended it towards the middle and inner eyelids. She didn't want to put too much emphasis on the light shadow, so she didn't use much of it.

"I used Suigetsu as an excuse to give you more time to disappoint me," Sasuke smirked and she forcefully closed his eyes with her fingers while she began his eyeliner.

"Testy girl," Sasuke smirked again while his eyes were closed. Sakura fought the urge to do the same thing with his mouth as she had his eyes.

"By the way," Sasuke added onto his comment, "Itachi left the contract and liability papers on the kitchen counter for you when you leave." Sakura nodded and spotted them atop the marble. She got down to business on his liner.

She was knowledgeable in men's eyeliner. She knew how to fashion it in such a way that it wouldn't appear "girlish," and too noticeable; she just had to pick a glossy, light chestnut color and glide it across the upper lashes slower and softer than normal. She also needed to terminate the liner at the corner and not flair out. This way it would be less conspicuous, more enticing, and more natural. She did so and asked him to open his eyes for her so she could accommodate the liner if needed. He did so and she was happy with how elegant it looked. Sakura annexed eyeliner on his waterline to add more volume to the eyes.

Sasuke looked more mystic and kingly than before.

She wrapped up her fruition with a heavier dosage of setting mineral powder on his face because there was a probability that it would be muggy in the club, or wherever he went to, considering the many reveling bodies he would be in proximity to. Sakura turned her back to him and looked at the clock; she had 23 minutes to spare.

"Since I have time left, do you mind if I shape your jawline? I can never do mine because mine doesn't have the sharpness like yours does," Sakura asked him.

"As long as you can get it in before 23, whatever," Sasuke granted her request indolently. She reached to the table to pick up a sweep brush, varnished it with a smoky black, and started her descent by his neck, tracing his jaw with the brush. She careened her head closer towards his jaw. She smoothed the brush out and swiped it evenly until she got to Sasuke's chin; she then let it dissolve. She replicated the process on the other side of his face. Sakura spend the last few minutes refining and unifying his jaw work.

Sakura picked up a clicking noise. Someone was in the course of opening the door, but had halted to talk as she also picked up that person speaking to another, but it was muffled to her. She took this time to gather her stuff up and deposit it into her backpack, looking up at her work as she did so. There wasn't any inadequacy in her art; Sasuke looked sublime. But he did even before she applied anything on him. The door finally popped open, letting shoots of sunlight in on Sakura's face.

"Sasuke, let's-" Suigetsu was cut off of his own sentence by himself as he looked at the girl putting things into her backpack. She finished and looked up at him. Sakura donned a beaming smile, almost mimicking the intensity of the sunlight rays behind them. She moved aside to let the sun's incandescence strike Sasuke's face. She walked to the kitchen counter to grab her contract papers and walked back to the door.

She nudged through them, lightly bumping into Suigetsu on her way out. Sakura pushed between the rest of Sasuke's teammates outside, the ones behind Suigetsu. The blue haired boy, nor the rest of the group, paid no attention to the oddly sly looking, departing girl.

The fervor of the sun irradiated Sasuke's face and cast a deep, lustrous yellow on Sakura's work. The light ricocheted off the golden hues decorating his eyelids, ricocheted back to his genteel jaw contour, and then back to the subtle, adorning eyeliner. Sasuke grimaced at the realization that the sunlight was making his makeup and presentation more radiant than it was originally.

The sun's fluorescence made it appear as if he were a celestial being.

Suigetsu shattered the open-mouthed silence for what seemed to go on for ages.

"When were angels allowed to roam the earth?" Suigetsu said impishly and let Deidara and Neji through the door. Itachi and Gaara could see over them so Suigetsu didn't bother.

"When indeed, yeah?" Deidara walked closer to Sasuke to espy the fantastic art embellishment upon his face. Deidara lifted a finger up to touch it but Sasuke swatted his hand away and stood up, the light further illuminating his body. He didn't need a mirror to know that Sakura's work was no doubt immaculate; Deidara wouldn't have advanced closer with that awestruck look in his eyes if it wasn't. Sasuke sighed, grabbed his phone, and threw on a hoody, being careful to not allow the fabric to even ghost over his face. Sasuke's frown twisted into a small, devilish grin as he walked out the door with his mates.

If Sasuke was to be stuck with her until the settlement had terminated, he could at least make her time with him a nightmare.

* * *

Sasuke solicited her number from Itachi, typed 2 small, 4 letter words and a period, and pressed send.

 _Sign them._

 _Author's Note: Finallyyyy some Sasuke/Sakura action for you guys. I just needed a small build up. There'll be lots more from now onward._ _And thanks for the feedback pt. 2! It really helps me grind out these chapters. :0_


	4. Baby Blue Flats

**Chapter 4**

Sakura clutched her phone closer to her chest, and it wasn't the glowing screen that warmed the area near her heart; it was pride. The two seemingly negligible words plastered on the tightly clutched cellphone wouldn't mean much to anyone else but her, and probably perplex or frighten them more than anything; they were forceful sounding words with a period. She liberated her grasp on the almost crushed device and read it again for the ninth time.

 _Sign them._

Sakura abandoned her phone and scrambled to acquire a pen from the drawers of her nightstand, gawkily dropping it on the floor by her bed. She leaned over her bed to pick it back up but desisted her clambering with the pen in her hand. Momentarily pausing, she reflected on exactly why she was clambering about. Sakura hadn't wavered in the belief of her competence in completing a flawless makeup assignment on Sasuke, nor did she waver in the carrying out of it. Sakura brought the pen up to her bed more passively than before and put it in her mouth.

 _I'm extremely qualified to do this job. Sasuke should even thank me for giving him the time of day._

Sakura giggled and nibbled on the writing utensil lodged between her teeth. Sasuke would probably be assuming the same thing about this situation. She wondered why he even bothered to interact with her via text message. She supposed he would mandate that responsibility to his brother or Suigetsu, but he didn't. Maybe he revered her now, deeming her important enough to contact her outside of work directly. Sakura's giggling digressed into a burst of laughter at that speculation.

The how's and why's of Sasuke's cryptic break in character didn't matter; she didn't care to explore his cavalier nature, much less dwell upon it. She plucked the utensil out of her jaws and took a more clarifying look at the stack of documents piled before her, forgoing the adrenaline buzz the text instilled in her.

The words **Business Partner Contract Agreement** were fanned out atop the page, followed by **Employee Agreement** and other paramount, bold phrases. She studied the scripts thoroughly before putting the pen to the page. Sakura furnished her name in the their respective blanks, letting her cursive tumble freely as she simulated her name multiple times. Her hand leaped around the vacant spaces where Sasuke would need to sign.

The discarded phone near her oscillated its' ringtone rapidly, startling Sakura from her fluid name signing. She stretched out her arm to see who was trying to reach her. She brought the phone back to her lap and the caller ID displayed the number of one Naruto Uzumaki at the top of the screen.

"Naruto :^)" as her phone would have her call him, hadn't spoken with her in a little over a year, primarily because he skipped a grade and went straight to college due to his sporty aptitude. His football pilgrimage demanded long hours and strenuous preliminary training so he was always left bereft of time for anything, much less herself. Sakura admitted to herself that she was a little thrilled to hear how her old friend was and what he was up to, no matter how irritatingly energized he could be at times. She responded after a few more rings.

"You know, it's not very gentleman like to call a lady only in the late hours of the night. Might make her think something's shady," Sakura said, forging a solemn tone but she heard a robust, genuine laugh at the end of the receiver. Sakura's mouth coiled into a large grin.

"I'm 110% gentleman, Sak'! Or, at least I try. But who needs to be a gentleman when you've got these bulging muscles to impress those ladies with?" Sakura could almost make out the act of him flexing with the arm not holding the phone and kissing it delicately on the bicep in her head. She chuckled at his in-cohesive words and her cerebral image.

"Those 'bulging muscles' of yours will only land you a scholarship. Don't expect to land the woman of your dreams with your 'godlike physique'," Sakura said and twirled the pen in her left fingers, her neck craning down to hold the phone to her shoulder. If she could physically hear a boy's pout over a phone, this would be it.

"Maybe you can help me go girl scouting tonight then... Me and the bros are having a little kickback at a place not too far from your school. You still go there, right?" Naruto asked her optimistically. She ratified his question with a yes.

"Cool! So I'll take it as a yes?" he almost whooped. Sakura couldn't turn down his extension, partially because it was her old friend she hadn't seen or talked to for a long while, and partially because Naruto was such a ray of hopeful sunshine that she couldn't bring herself to say no. Conjointly, her eyes and mind were jaded due to the almost nano-scale words on the papers that were way too compacted together for ocular relief.

"Sure, bud," Sakura conveyed to him through the phone's speaker, quieter than how she had been speaking before. She had always had a soft spot for the football player. Naruto cheered and declared that he would be around her place to pick her up in about 30 minutes. She accorded to him her apartment address knowing that her parents would be out of town for another week or so for a job recess.

"Get all dolled up. I wanna see how much you've progressed since your elementary days wearing that neon yellow lipstick and pink glitter eye shadow!" and with that, he ended their phone call to get ready himself. The girl smiled to herself and went to the nearest mirror to canvass her makeup as per his request. It identically resembled this morning's production with nothing out of place. She introspectively exulted in her know-how of keeping everything together throughout the day's liveliness. But she layered another coat of ruby lip stick as an insurance measure for what she'd be drinking tonight.

Sakura kept herself in her effortless ensemble from today, but substituted her airtight jeans in preference for a pair of tidy and loose boyfriend jeans. If she knew anything about Naruto and his friends, she knew that they'd be in perpetual motion; it was challenging to say the least keeping up with their celerity in those pants.

She traveled back to her bed with less effort than before, plopped on the edge, and reflected upon her friend she hadn't thought about much since he left her over a year ago. She situated her cheeks in the crook of her palms, elbows prodding into her jean clad thighs.

Now all she had to do was wait.

Sakura was too engrossed in her thoughts about Naruto and his consort to hearken the boy in question thumping a little too vigorously on her now almost impaired door. He knocked on it in a familiar sequence; 5 times with a pause, then 2 more times. It was only until she discerned the shifting knob from her peripheral did she rise from the bed to approach the assailant. She peered through the peephole for a humorous measure, making explicit eye contact with him, before receiving said assailant.

Naruto lobbed himself onto her, caring not if he fragmented Sakura's bones. The blonde boy enshrouded his face into her short hair and was compressing his grip not unlike an anaconda. She requited the action; she was startled at the realization that her arms almost didn't encompass his heavily built torso. Their reunion was abbreviated with him wreathing his arm around her hoodie covered shoulders and towing her towards his vehicle after she had locked the door.

"You look beautiful, Sakura. You've gotten so good at this makeup thing!" Naruto exclaimed, plundering a lateral glance at her. His genuine cajolery caused Sakura to smile brightly up at him. Her friend wasn't just saying that for kicks; he was always so sincere and unreserved that whatever he expressed to her was always a breath of fresh air. Naruto tousled her locks sportively as they shot the breeze while walking towards his car. Their conversation canvassed topics from their school life to which friends they had still networked with.

They reached their destination thereupon. Naruto's "refined man" claim he had laid stake to earlier was proven unsurprisingly specious as he didn't open the car door for her. She undid the front seat door herself and scanned the backseat before taking settling.

A trifling number of Naruto's otherwise copious amount of friends were lounged in the backseat. She recognized two out of the three of them as her former acquaintances and Naruto's old football buddies, Shikamaru and Kiba. The latter had his dog lolling in his lap customarily. Sakura exchanged greetings politely.

As the 5 of of them alternated idle chatter among themselves, Sakura was a tad bit perturbed as the sports car wriggled its' way into a monstrous parking lot permeated with zigzagging conglomerations of people. Brusque music reverberated loud enough to convulse the vehicle. The driver miraculously secured a parking spot in between two trucks that towered in comparison to his car, shifted it into gear, and turned to grin at his passengers.

"Sak', we know you don't like huge parties, but that's 'cuz you've never actually been to a good one. We, me mostly, wanted to give you a shot at enjoying yourself at one for just one night," Naruto vocalized, the grandiose grin still smothered on his face. Sakura was still not stalwart enough to say no to Naruto's indefatigable efforts. She exhaled and let her displeasure be known by her facial statement and an arm cross.

"I didn't know it was customary for old friends to lure their friend they haven't seen in over a year into a trap," Sakura said, her curving lips forsaking her attempt to keep a stony-faced expression.

 _How could one night at a huge house party hurt anyone?_

The boy whooped when he knew he had Sakura on board with his misleading artifice. She foolishly left her phone in the car's glove compartment so it wouldn't get broken by the thrashing party-goers and forthwith felt contrite with the decision.

A fleeting amount of time later and Sakura had accidentally strayed from her group in accordance to the crowd's invigorating jolting and gyrating. She was too short to peer over the tall, dancing throng so she made a beeline towards the monumental mansion, hoping to attain higher ground. If she could stand atop the soaring balcony she spotted from her position, she would be able to locate Naruto and his friends; they had distinct features and hair. She hoped they would dawdle in the parking lot looking for her for a little while longer.

Her small-scale form was auspicious in this locality because she could easily meander throughout the perspiring bodies in the cold autumn air. Because of this convenient advantage she fleetingly arrived at the huge structure.

Sakura regarded the mansion's entrance way, funnily observing that the door was one bolt short from being completely lacerated off its' hinges. She pried it open gingerly and was squalled with the formidable axe scent. A handful of teenagers spiraled to see who had opened the door, and she was eminently aware of of the dull, drunk gawks thrown her way as she hiked to the top floor. The music reached its' peak the further she traversed the steps to the second story.

The second floor may have even incorporated more people than the first one. Sakura rambled through the skimpily clothed torsos to happen on an almost desolate hallway, considering that there was sparsely any room to breathe in the other rooms. She slowly walked through it, opening vacant doors to see if it would lead her to the third floor. After dejectedly scouring the last room in the hall, Sakura shut the door. A glint of optimism sparked in her eyes as she beheld a small, acute corner which would give her more options to leaf through. As she approached, she heard dissimilar feminine giggles.

Sakura felt her face turn as red as her eye shadow; she knew by the extensive amount of girlish murmurs and that singular, male throaty groan that territory she didn't want to encroach on was around that corner. The girlish laughter lowered in volume when she heard something unzip. It only sounded like a jacket, only because it was a long but quick noise. She resolved to swallow her embarrassment before it was too late and more corrupt actions were committed behind the wall.

The girl instantaneously started walking as briskly as she could without the pace metamorphosing into a full sprint, only discontinuing her straight and narrow field of vision to scrutinize the pathways that looked like they could point to higher ground. She distinguished one, and turned to twist the knob to open it. A mental alarm resonated in her head as her outlying vision told her something was wrong with the situation she had avoided.

The boy encompassed by the girls was tall enough that Sakura could make out it was Sasuke. She vaguely recalled his brother saying something along the lines of "Sasuke's all or nothing," to her yesterday. Sasuke's head reposed upon the wall he was edged to; it slumped to his left shoulder intemperately, the motion lacking the gymnast grace he always sustained about him. With his neck now more unprotected than before, a brunette in heels began to originate a succession of open mouthed kisses down the pale pillar of his nape. Sasuke moaned and his kneecaps ebbed, eventually allowing his usually fluid form to coast down the wall recklessly.

Sakura's handle on the knob slackened.

Another brunette, a more sinister looking contradistinction between the other brunette, seized his arm and deposited the hand on her waist. With the hand loosely and not completely consenting around her, she drew herself towards his body and ceased the task her blonde counterpart embarked on; she unfastened the last zipper mouth. His leather jacket dangled perilously off of the shoulder his head wasn't slumped upon. With a nimble tug, she threw the article of clothing to the dingy, party-ridden floor. A fetching, collared, short sleeve button up lied underneath. Two different girls started to purloin their real prize as four hands departed to unbutton the shirt.

As they fondled with the first button, Sasuke assembled himself together just enough to heave his head to the wall and hook his neck in the opposite direction to stare at the area where Sakura was standing. His eyes seemingly found it hard to engage in eye contact with Sakura, because they couldn't, or didn't, move from the spot next to her feet. They sluggishly retreated to her baby blue flats and a streak of recognizance sparked in them. With a substantial amount of exertion, they finally made contact with her own.

If Sakura couldn't tell he was dangerously inebriated before, she could tell now.

Several occurrences unfold when people down too much alcohol; right off the bat, their eyes give them away. Drinking a copious amount of intoxicating beverage produces either a contraction or dilation to the pupil. In her parent's case, it was the former; Sasuke's was the latter. Intoxicated eyes also reacted in an abnormally languid fashion than their intact parallels.

When light filters through normal, operative eyes, it contracts or dilates in accordance to the lighting they're introduced to. It was poorly lit in the hallway, but the group stood in the most lighted place, right underneath the bulb. Sasuke's huge, sedated pupils hadn't even adjusted to the brightness of the space. His reaction time was next to nothing.

Lastly, the most common sign was the brutal redness alcohol dissipated eyes donned. Sasuke's eyes looked parched and the blood vessels within seemed to pop out, spawning a bloodshot appearance in them.

Sakura's grasp on the doorknob altogether marooned. She was unable to shatter the eye connection between her and Sasuke. Her feet were lodged into the ground. She couldn't move, and felt sick at the story unfolding in front of her. His assailants never brought their attack on him to an impasse as dilated black met dilated green from across the room. It was as if she wasn't even existent to the girls. Button number 4 opened, and 10 silky, long nailed fingers reached into the shirt to claim their prize.

Sasuke and Sakura's eye contact was smashed to pieces when she saw the adult woman in the group extend her hand to the band of his jeans. Sasuke's eyes closed, preparing for his desensitized fate. Her epinephrine quantities were at an all time high, and her "fight or flight" response came into play. Sakura swallowed.

Sakura didn't like Sasuke in any way, shape, or form. He was malicious, venomous, and cocky. She didn't care for him at all, and hadn't even had a proper greeting given to her from him today. It was only him teasing and insulting her. Sasuke wasn't worth it.

The woman was pulling the zipper down, down, down, and Sasuke wasn't consenting.

It didn't register to Sakura that she ran straight to Sasuke and punched the oldest female directly in the face, decking her to the ground, until after it happened. The antagonists hollered and lurched back from Sasuke with posthaste, mortified at what had just happened. They didn't bend to pick up their friend, instead leaving her there with a hemorrhaging, crushed nose, fearful of what would happen if they did.

The group figured that Sakura was Sasuke's girlfriend, and shot in the opposite direction, around the corner Sakura had hesitated to cross. Sakura forcibly seized one girl by the arm before she could abscond and authorized her to attend to her friend's casualty.

Sasuke had passed out thereafter from menacing blood alcohol levels next to the woman with the broken nose who had subsequently passed out from dangerous levels of blood loss. It was ironic.

Sakura hoisted Sasuke onto her shoulders with great effort, his torso suspended over her front and his legs from her back. She affixed her hands to the underside of his thighs, being sure to keep him at an equilibrium. Since he had been whittling his weight for the county turn out, he wasn't laden with extra water weight.

"I assume you guys had a room with a bed for when things began to crescendo?" Sakura asked the girl and she visibly winced. She nodded shamefully, looking downwards at her faint accomplice. She looked back up and pointed to the door that Sakura was going to comb through for a third floor access.

Sakura traversed back to her prior grounded position by the door. She unsecured it, not expecting a clean, made up, king sized bed to be present, and laid Sasuke as tenderly as she could on it. She pulled the blankets over him, wordlessly anathematizing her concern for the boy.

Sakura knew Sasuke wouldn't recollect this night's incidents, and even if he did, he would never thank her for it.

 _Author's Note: Again, thanks for the feedback! :))) It makes me so happy you don't even know. Anyways, here's a little more plot developer for you guys haaaah._


	5. Dependent Savior

**Chapter 5**

This was the second night in a row Sakura had occupied with an uncommunicative Sasuke. After laying the torpid body down and tucking it in on its' side so as to prevent choking if he vomited, she surveyed his heartbeat with one index finger pressed motionlessly against his throat; the pulse was patently below the customary number. Spasmodic breaths, a whopping 10 seconds apart, followed when his skin turned more anemic looking than before.

Alcohol was bound to ensue hilarity and gaiety in the drinker in your quintessential, cinematic film. It rendered alcohol's repercussions as negligible, with the teenager passing out on the floor, only to wake up in the morning with a throbbing headache that one sip of water conveniently placed on their nightstand could effortlessly rectify. The revelers would laugh it off and undertake it again the following night.

Sure, they might be subjected to the bathroom for dry heaving or worse. But their best friend would unfailingly accompany them to support their head and constrain their hair back throughout the movie glorified act.

Sakura coveted this fantasy world as she swiftly perused the area for another cover and to procure a glass of water for the liquor-stupefied boy. She unquestionably was not his best friend, but she still searched for everything in the bedroom that could alleviate his edging, hypothermic state before she woke him up to begin the process of helping him function. She discovered a woolen blanket in the connecting room and promptly lied it on him. She filled up an available plastic cup with tap water.

She sat on the bed margin, examining his symptoms more vigilantly before taking a course of action.

Sakura couldn't call an ambulance, nor could she leave him alone in this gelid area.

Sasuke was indisputably severely envenomed. The more she let him sleep, the more alcohol was being absorbed into his attenuated enough bloodstream. Getting him wakened was the priority, so he could sit up and hopefully take in more breaths than before. He needed much more oxygen in his core to buttress his circulatory and nervous system.

She knew that Sasuke had drank on an empty stomach, which only made her enterprise that much more difficult. If Sasuke really was "all or nothing," he would've already downed a chancy amount of alcohol; yoke that with an unfilled stomach, and every infinitesimal sip converted into a noxious, carcinogenic cocktail. Having food in your system-in particular, lean proteins and complex carbohydrates- would slow the absorption process, and wouldn't impact one en masse.

The girl began the process she had duplicated too many times as a 17 year old, calling to mind the way she maneuvered her parent's unconscious forms when they guzzled down one too many. In Sasuke's case, she had to proceed with more attentiveness.

Sakura elevated Sasuke's legs up by about a foot, stationing pillows underneath his knees so she could slacken his already unsecured clothing. After affirming that his legs were at the appropriate angle and wouldn't slip from his sideways position, she unfastened the remaining zipper on his jeans, the tiny piece that was scarcely left prevailing after what had happened to them, and tugged his jeans down softly to the area below his stabbing hipbones. She haphazardly ghosted over the two knobs with her digits and shivered. It looked like his skin had been impaled with the spears, not quite making it all the way into his body the way they jolted out.

After removing his already unbuttoned white shirt, Sakura placed two hands on Sasuke's laterals and pressed hard in one fluid, rigid motion. This was a commonplace practice for Sakura; framing the impervious sides of the comatose body with two stringent presses so as to not alarm the person into choking on their own bodily fluids at the sudden, unanticipated contact. Sasuke bolted up with a grimace and unbelievably wide eyes mortared onto his face. His pupils were contracted in place of his prior dilation now and he looked directly at her.

The grimace didn't vacate even as his eyes sprinted to every corner of the room. Sasuke's eye fluctuations seemed to be voluntary because they quickly glided throughout the objects in the room without preclude. Sakura uneasily noticed the twitched movement from Sasuke's finger. It convulsed with such an unusual intensity, but Sakura didn't catch onto the grisly reality she had never considered before until Sasuke's one operational finger pointed to an extensive patch of brown discoloration on his collarbones, coupled with more blotches and bite marks below his jaw.

He let Sakura's eyes trail the path his finger coursed to next. He discontinued it at the glass of water by the bed, flickering his eyes from the woman induced bruises and the cup. They quivered back and forth faster and faster until Sasuke's eyes slammed shut and he swooned back into the bed to face the ceiling. Sakura swiftly turned him back to the recovery position. Her adrenaline was so high that it hadn't dawned on her that Sasuke's frantic eye and finger indications weren't just the mindless ramifications of being completely inebriated. When her mind revived from the influx of panic induced chemicals, it went blank again when she registered Sasuke's clues.

 _Holy shit._

Sasuke had consumed rohypnol. The girls Sakura found him with contaminated his drink with the date rape drug. Sasuke's body was laced with an absence of food, an abundant volume of alcohol, and a dubious amount of rohypnol.

The boy was a ticking time-bomb, and his time was elapsing more by the second.

Sakura flipped through her mind for any way to help him. She had no knowledge of the drug, and wasn't sure how to progress in combating the deteriorating effects of both alcohol and rohypnol combined. Sasuke's phone buzzed from inside his back pocket.

Her first instinct was to call an ambulance, but she adjudicated on Itachi. An EMS vehicle would no doubt stir hysteria and the police would institute a ban on Sasuke's famed career, besmirching Sasuke and his whole group. She knew that the boy would rather die- literally- than be veto'd from the career he was so suitable for. Society frowned on underage drinkers, and would likely think he was using the illegal drug as a long term performance enhancer.

Sakura vaguely recollected her delirious instructions to Itachi over the phone before he and Gaara bolted into the room. Sakura couldn't recount the specifications of what happened thereafter, though. She was completely stupefied since she found out how critical Sasuke's reality was. Sakura watched as the pair clambered around; Itachi instructed Gaara through various steps while he did others.

Sakura fell through the air, effectively landing the right temple of her head on a precise corner of the nightstand, which was just enough to arrange short term memory loss for the night.

Itachi and Gaara laid Sakura's unconscious body next to Sasuke's now normally breathing one, not lying her on her side because she was only comatose from shock.

* * *

Perhaps it was a good thing that Sakura nor Sasuke could call to mind the phenomenon that transpired last night. Sasuke felt something swish against his leg.

Or, conceivably it wasn't, as Sasuke awoke to see Sakura careen off his bed, fists closed and disposed in front of her chest. She adopted the stance of a cat about to lunge. Evidently they'd ended up in his bed last night, and Sasuke admitted to himself that it was the most superlative rest he'd gotten in weeks. He regarded her idly and didn't move from his position on his elbow, radiating pure sleepy indifference to if she assaulted him or not.

He was, however, a little disquieted that he couldn't remember anything from the prior night, much less Sakura and him sleeping together. His clothes weren't absent and only the first two buttons of his shirt were undone, and all of her clothes were on, so he took the assumption that nothing of that nature had transpired. His head soon wrenched with pain from separating it from its' rightful place on the silken pillow. He reposed it back to the soft paradise, still looking at her. His hair unfurled onto it and the deed unveiled the lengthy stretch of his debauched neck.

Sasuke saw Sakura's eyes augment with disbelief, which morphed into horror the further her eyes advanced downwards his body. He connected his fingers to the territory on his neck and collarbones she was the most mortified with and put pressure on them. They were swelled areas that were tender to the touch; hickeys and bite inscriptions. Sasuke groaned at the cognizance that he probably did have sex with Sakura. He pitched his arm over his light sensitive eyes, effectively engulfing whatever light tried to flow in. Sakura apparently wasn't pleased with the way Sasuke was managing the situation because she started off shouting, accentuating some words with ire.

"Out of 7.442 billion people in the world, I just had to choose _you_ to sleep with. The most egotistical, self-centered asshole on the planet, who doesn't have the _least bit_ of decency to even react to this situation. I seriously hope you used protection. We're completely and _utterly_ fucked if I get pregnant. You know what, I honestly probably am. I wouldn't expect _you_ to care about any consequences whatsoever, in a drunken haze or normally."

Sasuke peeked through his cover to see her eyes ablaze with abhorrence for him. He was taken aback at the veritable emotions billowing in her eyes, sexually electrified at the revulsion and unmitigated emotion she had for him burning in her eyes right now. If this was the way Sakura behaved when she was truly irate, Sasuke would take pleasure in every primitive and crude remark he threw at her. He snickered at her hateful declaration.

Sasuke wasn't agonizing over this; when he would occasionally accommodate his drive with a tipsy one night stand, he would always be certain to place guard himself. He was still a little concerned at the fact he could remember thoroughly nil from their confrontation or how they winded up in his room, in his bed, sleeping soundly with all their clothes on. There was no corroboration between them besides the bruises, so he still somewhat queried if the event took place.

"I'll smack that snicker right the fuck out of your system, Sasuke," Sakura continued shouting at him, and brandished her fists, "don't fuck with me. I need to know if I'm carrying the spawn of Satan in me." Someone from behind her snickered loudly enough to be noticed and Sasuke saw her turn around to face them with that indignation in her eyes.

"I can feel the seed of Satan pull me towards him," Suigetsu said, exploiting his gymnast poise to glide over to her and place his palm on her stomach. She clouted his hand away roughly and sneered. 4 more bodies materialized at Sasuke's threshold. Itachi was at the anterior, a reserved mirth stringing his lips up into a small smile. His smile seemed oddly noncommittal, Sasuke observed.

"You don't fuck with me either, Suigetsu. Especially you, Itachi. Tell me what happened right now," Sakura dictated. Her small stature and tiny, brandished fists made it nonviable to the males in the room to take her seriously.

So they didn't.

"What happened," Deidara sidled through Itachi and Gaara, "is that you and that handsome devil over there," Deidara motioned mockingly towards Sasuke's bed, "went all the way last night. Lucky for you, I got it all on tape for you to relive every second of it."

"What's up with all the comparison between me and Satan?" Sasuke asked from the solace of his bed. Itachi, Neji, and Gaara chuckled to themselves and watched as Sakura almost attacked Deidara on the spot.

"I'll shove that "tape" up your-" Sakura began but was interjected by Suigetsu.

"You're gonna have all the babies, Sak'! You'll be the mother of many legends!" Suigetsu whisked her up in his lean arms and spun her.

"He'll have Sasuke's moves," Suigetsu continued, darting her around the room and catching her nimbly right before she fell, "and your pretty face." The blue haired boy catapulted her back to the bed where she alighted on it ungracefully next to Sasuke. Sasuke watched as Sakura angrily vaulted back up and grabbed ahold of Suigetsu's collar while he grinned from ear to ear at her. She renounced the grip on him when she spied Itachi's de-stressed facial expression.

Sasuke had a notion Sakura looked to Itachi, not just in this spectacle, for reassurance among many other things. His sibling always involuntarily emitted that comforting big brother aura around others, and it made it hard for people to not be consoled when he was nearby. Sasuke didn't perceive Itachi as that stereotype anymore, instead viewing him as an adversary even when he was his teammate. Sasuke could handle himself just fine without him.

Sasuke was glaringly incognizant to the irony that littered the statement.

He watched Sakura walk over to his brother with the tension from her shoulders extinguished, planting her feet in place along with her right hand to her hip.

"Itachi, I haven't seen you for years and I can still tell that that smile you're wearing is refusing to tell the truth," Sakura looked up at him, "so just spit it out already so I can have some peace of mind."

"You and my brother did not have sex last night," Itachi said, looking right back down at her.

"As far as I know," Itachi extended. Sasuke made eye contact with him transverse Sasuke's spacious room. Nonchalant gaze met nonchalant gaze and Sakura looked back at the blemishes cluttering his collarbones and nape. Sasuke watched as she grappled with her words about them just to remain mute until she began to address no one in particular.

"My friend tricked me into going to the party with him and his friends. I lost them in the huge crowd and can't remember anything beyond that point. I for sure didn't drink anything. So where and who found me?" Sakura inquired to the room. Sasuke was mildly interested as well.

"Itachi and I found you in the crowd; from all the shoving going on, it looked as if someone had accidentally knocked you out. We were just going inside the house as we saw a circle gather around you. As for Sasuke, he drank too much and passed out on a couch," Gaara spoke up quietly. Sasuke listened and felt as if Gaara had rehearsed the story beforehand.

"That makes sense, I guess. But why did you guys put us in the same beds? That just seems unconventional," Sakura asked the red headed speaker.

"Nobody else could watch over you besides Itachi. All of us had practice this morning, and Itachi wanted to stay behind for you two. He wanted to keep you in one place so he wouldn't have to constantly walk back and forth, and the couches were occupied with Deidara and Suigetsu last night," Gaara disclosed to her. Sasuke directed a sharp look towards his friend, tenaciously believing that that story was fabricated and prepared beforehand.

"This morning? What time is it?"

"It's 5 PM. You guys slept together for 15 hours," Suigetsu said, "a local record if I'm correct. But nobody can beat my time of 18 and a half," he winked salaciously at her.

"Yes, we've all heard of your 'gymnast prowess' in bed Suigetsu," Deidara flicked the blonde segment of his hair that incessantly insisted it be over a single eye to the side, "and we don't want to hear anymore of it." The blue haired boy pouted sullenly.

Sasuke slipped into his private bathroom throughout the duration of their banter. His stomach was repudiating whatever he had imbibed last night; Sasuke was seasoned enough in the area of alcohol to know that that wasn't all he had downed last night. His digestive system didn't ordinarily decline his liquor so violently. As Sasuke purged his body from the rest of the remaining intoxicant, he overheard Suigetsu ask where he disappeared to.

While scrutinizing his gaunt, makeup-less face, his eyes strung down to the train of lust blots and bites.

Sasuke was perturbed to find small, smeared pink markings in the furrow of the bite and in the yellow ring around the brown.

It wasn't Sakura's lipstick color.

 _Author's Note: This chapter was infuriating to write. Seriously, it took me way way more time than the others. It was like I had writer's block all day. ;-; I'm not even happy with how it turned out, but it had the order of events right._

 _Like always, every fave, review, follow is v welcome. :s it's hard to get motivated when I spend lots of time on each chapter and get only a lil' feedback y'know. I still love ya'll though._


	6. Pacific Euphoria

**Chapter 6**

Sakura perused over Sasuke's bruise administered neck and collarbones a little too closely one day later, and that's when he leaned back with a snarl. The love bites had waned from his snowy skin, but it was still necessary to plaster them with concealer.

"The competition is tiki themed. Do you even know anything about Hawaii?" he snapped, crossing his arms with a scowl. She noticed that he shrugged his long sleeve up composedly to shield her eyes from the sins of his skin.

"You'll be a centerpiece in a luau, hmm? Will you be the one wearing a grass skirt or a coconut bra? Or is it both?" Sakura slanted back as well, her perky, grassy eyes meeting his challenging black ones.

"That honor would obviously be given to Deidara and Suigetsu. How idiotic of you to not know," he said, "I'll be the centerpiece, though. It's hard to miss veritable talent." Sakura rolled her eyes at his flagrant narcissism. She, too, was vain about her skills, but didn't flaunt it so patently.

"It's only hard to miss when you use physical coercion on the floor to intimidate your teammates to let you have the center, which I'm sure you do. I guess I'll see in a few days," Sakura presumed. She leaned to him now with her elbows on her knees, examining his face with more scrutiny; she knew Sasuke's face would harmonize well with the Pacific Ocean palette she had stored in a cabinet at home. His nice visage blurred as her eyes focused and perused throughout his empty, vast apartment. His mates were out to practice since the morning, and some were running errands, getting things to prepare for the tournament. Sasuke ignored her statement.

"It's a bracket this time. It's like wrestling, but with no physical altercations between the two on the floor. Judges mark us through the performance mainly based on appearance, technique and formula, pliability, and more minor approaches. So it's imperative that you make sure my appearance won't thaw during the duration of all the brackets I'm put through. Also, you need to gather your things; we leave in 3 hours."

Sakura nodded, regarding his face once more. She illustrated in her head a coral pink and a bold, golden yellow she would exersize on his eyes. She trailed down to his cupid's bow lips and was determined to slightly amplify its' pale color with a very light pastel gold.

"It needs to be fire proof, to be more exact. I'll be implementing long fire whips and bracelets. The flames will be red, and will transition to orange, yellow, then white. The coldest flame will be at the beginning of every performance, if that helps. The whips will gradually get longer with each audition I successfully complete," Sasuke told Sakura. She looked back to his eyes, and they were as fervent as the fire he was dealing. The passion fizzled out immediately when she concentrated her gaze on them.

"You won't be burning your face or whipping the flames across it, right? As long as it doesn't directly come into contact with the skin, there will be no problem," she said confidently, but was confidentially nervous at the daunting task set before her. An undertaking of this nature was off-putting. Self doubt tiptoed into Sakura's mind; she swiftly shoved it out when Sasuke's haughty face morphed into a puckish one at her agitated expression.

They both had fortuitously caught each other's rare, unwonted expressions; Sasuke's as adrenaline filled and passionate, and Sakura's as unnerved and discomposed. The only difference between the two was the Sasuke called her out for hers.

"Frightened, are we?" Sasuke tipped his body towards hers to get a better look at her now fear dissipated face, cogently closing the spacious capacity between them.

While Sasuke sat on the leather couch, Sakura perched on a swivel chair backwards. Her legs were on either side of it, along with her chest pressed against the chair back, and her toes ghosted the ground. She shook her head as an answer and tipped it towards his daringly.

"I highly doubt that," Sasuke's cigarette suffused breath stroked her nose. She deduced that he and his group used the coffin nails as an appetite suppressant to shear weight for the upcoming event.

"This is the big leagues, not your local high school competition. How will your talents transcend that of a run down, school theater?" he continued while looking directly into her eyes. He opened his comely lips again.

"You're good, but you're not that good."

Sakura was shocked at his interference in her emotions, in the credibility of her finesse, and her mind. Sasuke wasn't one to incorporate himself in needless conversation, nor get in close proximity to them, especially with one such as herself. However, she was prudent to not let the shock materialize on her face so as not to encourage his malicious behavior.

"Your vindictive words don't enfeeble me in any way, Sasuke. I'm assertive in my prowess and won't be weakened by silly jabs from you," Sakura vocalized pointedly. Sakura hated the way his lips dragged up into a sideways smirk on the right side of his face.

"Incapacitating people is what I do. I only associate myself with headstrong people," Sasuke's breath was starting to smell more and more like smog, but was compounded with cherry tomatoes to produce an outlandishly sugary, satisfying smell.

"That doesn't make sense, because you obviously have an inferiority complex. I would've figured you only mingled with those you deemed were below you to validate your feelings," Sakura voiced to him; her minty, gum exhalation socialized with his. Their propinquity was disintegrated when Sasuke rose from the couch to snare her in with his arms, his palms on the back of the chair. Sakura glowered up at him, which was a feat now considering he was twice her height now. Sasuke's countenance was set in its' standard impassiveness, but his voice was dusted with a light pique.

"Don't forget who you're talking to. I am above you in every way, and it's not wise to make pestilential assumptioms about my character," Sasuke said. Sakura wasn't fazed; she hopped off the chair with an ungainly elegance that Sasuke couldn't help but snicker at, and shoved her chin up to encounter him closer.

"I'm working with you as an equal," was all she said. Sasuke chuckled at her again, shaking his head and backing away from her. His long calves were compressed against the couch. Sakura noticed it was warmer now with his departure.

From what Sakura could determine from the air temperature, Sasuke's body was freezing, incised with years of painstaking athletic repetition and a deficiency of calories to conduct the best performances as a lighter version of himself. She inwardly bewailed at his strenuous lifestyle from birth, or when he was able to walk. Even though it was Sasuke, she couldn't help but feel forlorn at his fate. He was coached to be ruthless, and taught to be guarded.

"I will never consider you my equal," Sasuke said, seamlessly slipping around her to slide through the apartment to gather his possessions and rally them together in the open suitcase on the coffee table. Sakura rolled her eyes and decided it was time to collect her things as well. Hawaii was an 8 and a half hour flight from Japan. She traversed from the chair to the door and was almost smacked in the face with the sheer force the door relinquished.

"Why are you always leaving when we come? Is Sasuke the only one good enough for you?" Suigetsu swept himself in the apartment and grabbed Sakura by the waist.

"I could show you that I'm the best of the group," he resumed with a coquettish smile. Karin followed behind him, along with the rest of Sasuke's group and their various partners, albeit Hinata and Neji, who were gathering their belongings elsewhere.

"Maybe some other time, Sui. I need to get my things," Sakura said with a playful shoulder poke. Suigetsu's eyes illumined up, optimistic at the sultry future with the pink head.

"Just kidding," and at that, his eyes took on a crestfallen tone. She giggled and extracted his hand from the curve of her waist.

"We have your things," Ino piped up, "I knew everything you'd need for the trip. They're right here," she heaved a heavy looking bag up by her hand and tossed it to her. Sakura seized it uncouthly, unzipped it, and scoured the contents; she didn't trust the integrity of her friend enough to expect everything to be present. She ultimately found the the utensils and coloration she would use on Sasuke and zipped it back up. Ino shammed fake hurt at Sakura's undisguised distrust.

"Naruto also dropped your phone off," Ino threw Sakura's phone to her. She had 40 missed calls from Naruto, and just as many texts from him and others.

Itachi sidled through Ino and walked to Sasuke, and noiselessly conversed with him. Sasuke was putting things in the case when Sakura overheard Itachi mention something about first class. The younger brother nodded and extracted his wallet from the pack pocket of his jeans and he showed Itachi the expiration date on his passport. Itachi pivoted around and addressed the group in the entryway of the apartment.

"I assume everyone has legal and valid passports?" he asked, and everyone nodded simultaneously. The gymnasts in the faction clearly had theirs, and it wasn't atypical for quality makeup artists to have them as well, even if they were young.

"So whose car are we taking to the port, uhn? Yours is too small, Itachi, yeah. And where is Neji and his cousin, hm?" Deidara questioned.

"We're meeting them at the aiport. They haven't kept in touch in a while and were catching up today with their family. We're taking Gaara's car."

Sasuke shut the small suitcase quietly, walking to the doorway; Itachi went into his room and grabbed his as well, following his brother. The siblings paused there and waited for their coterie to convene with them after they gathered their things. In about 5 minutes, Sasuke locked the door behind them.

Some flowed down the apartment stairs, their bodies maneuvering like a well-oiled machine, and some trampled gauchely. The mean, black haired, boy at the front made the pink haired girl at the back look completely uncoordinated with the way he moved so smoothly. She resented him a little bit for the grace he sported, and that she lacked.

Sakura took console in the fact that Sasuke probably didn't even know what foundation was used for.

* * *

As they boarded the plane, the flight attendants were swift to gingerly place their belongings on the overhead compartment for them. Sasuke settled himself into an opulent window seat, placing a palm on his defined chin. His mates and the artists had an ample amount of space and seats, but his brother's artist made the decision to sit the nearest to him. He opted to disregard the blonde's presence and her imminent attempts to interact with him.

The boy watched as his artist ventured into the congested economy class sector; she seemed to actively be seeking something or someone out. Sakura vanished completely, and Sasuke pivoted his head slightly on his palm, vaguely attentive to her intentions. Her friend appeared to not be troubled with her disappearance, instead prioritizing flirting with him.

It was only when Sasuke discerned the wailing of an infant nearing their private class did he understand what she was doing. He remembered the distinct wails of that infant.

When they had first arrived at the airport, there had been a haggard looking woman shouldering a crying baby standing in line in front of them. Sakura abandoned her ongoing conversation with Deidara about makeup and tried to tune into the noise. When she pinpointed the juvenile pandemonium, her face softened and she discontinued her socializing with Deidara. Sakura remained hushed throughout the remainder of the line shortening. She would keep looking over at the mother and her newborn, though.

Sakura revealed to the weary mother where she and her baby would be staying; in the two sumptuous, large seats in the corner, purposefully isolated from the rest of Sasuke's team. The mother transferred the baby to Sakura's caring arms, because she seemed infatuated with the small being. The baby forthwith ceased her squalling when she swayed her benevolently and mumbled gibberish to her quietly.

Sakura shook her head at the mother's worried, wearisome face, smiled brightly, and relinquished the baby back to her.

There were no more seats; Itachi had booked all 13 of them with a phone call a few days ago. The extra one was for an emergency, or if someone wanted a foot rest. Sakura's seat was sacrificed to a spent mother and her disturbed, but now tranquil, infant. She wasn't cognizant of Sasuke now staring intently at the transaction, nor to the rest of his team doing the same. Sakura slid the plane doors closed as she walked out of the room; the uproar from the economy class was muffled completely with the click of the doors.

The mother walked to her seat tiredly. Her child had fallen asleep at Sakura's tender touch, and even though she was gone, the baby still slept soundly. The lady, burdened with a multitude of wrinkles too early for her age, made direct eye contact with Sasuke, and spoke with a firmness and loudness that the whole private class could hear. Her voice was thickened with a coarse Japanese accent.

"Your girlfriend a very kind woman. Treat her right. She deserve it," the mom said to Sasuke.

"She is not my girlfriend," he said. His palm was off his chin, and he hadn't realized his body had leaned forward from the back of the plush seat significantly.

"Passion in your eyes and stance say otherwise. Treat her," the mother ended her sentence with a head nod. She soon fell asleep with the child in the seat next to her.

No matter how much Suigetsu and Deidara teased him about that on the flight to Hawaii, Sasuke knew that he was only mystified by Sakura's weak nature.

That's why his eyes were like that, but he couldn't explain his stance.

* * *

Sakura looked like a kid in a candy store. She was astounded by the sweltering humidity, bewildered by the huge, equatorial trees dappling Hawaii's landscape, and startled by the seemingly endless sandy beaches eating up the ocean for watery nourishment. Her pink hair coalesced with the remarkable flower colors surrounding the hotel. She rolled her long sleeves up as sweat configured on her forehead, only to create more moisture by running up to the entrance to receive a flower crown and necklace by a hula girl.

Sasuke looked at Itachi; he was transfixed on Sakura's Pacific euphoria. He felt a modicum of jealousy. Ino was just as gleeful with her environment, maybe even more so than his artist. But he knew that Sakura's delight was uncontaminated with anything else but innocence, and that's why Itachi was drawn to her so. Ino was not only allured by the Hawaiian environment, but she was also enticed by the idea of the shirtless hula men, and was envious of the toned bodies of the hula girls Sakura was speaking with.

His brother was pulled to pure and beautiful things, and Sasuke wasn't dense. His pink headed makeup artist was as untainted and prepossessing as 17 year old girls come. Of course, Sasuke and Itachi had been with girls far more pretty, but Sakura had quaint characteristics.

She had the facial attributes of a nymph; the arched eyebrows, the full, pout lips, and the big eyes. But she had a small button nose, a soft, curved face, and well rounded cheekbones. She was a muted sprite mixed with a plump faced young child.

Her bright pink hair was chopped extremely short, and Sasuke found himself liking the hairstyle more and more, even though he was completely against it in the beginning. It splayed around her head everywhere wildly when she was excited.

He still hated the annoying color.

Sasuke and Itachi were in a separated reverie when Sakura ran back to them and flung a flower crown on both of their heads. Sasuke's was indigo and Itachi's was maroon.

"Ino and I can't wait to put a little bit of bold color on your faces. The competition being in Hawaii is a sign for the application of red and yellow eyeshadow. You guys will look so pretty," Sakura said, straightening Itachi's crown. She hadn't been exactly precise with his.

"Especially you, Sasuke. That brooding face of yours will look less sulky when I'm done with it," she continued after fixing his brother's crown.

"You're not getting anywhere near me with those colors."

"Of course I am, silly. The contract I signed specifically told me that it was okay, great even, for Sakura Haruno to use bright colors on Sasuke Uchiha's face," Sakura said and stepped sideways to face Sasuke with those leafy eyes of hers.

"Then you obviously signed the wrong contract."

"I have it with me."

"Oh yeah?"

"I'll highlight the exact statement for you if you win the competition. You don't wanna scroll through all those tiny print pages when you could just have me highlight it for you, right?"

Though it was a frivolous proposal, Sasuke was intrigued to what Sakura would come up with when he won; he never planned on losing, so he would find out soon.

 _Author's Note: Woowwww I'm back. I got in a car accident and was recovering for a bit. Sorry for the really weird time gap with this chapter lmao. This was yet again another frustrating chapter to write, but not even close to the one before this. Enjoy guys^^ as usual, gimme your thoughts and what not._


	7. Volcanic Deity

**Chapter 7**

From atop the fourth story balcony of he and Itachi's hotel room, he swiveled a white, fuming stick between his lissome fingers. He escorted it to his lips indolently, drawing a deep, thick drag from it. Sasuke exhaled and a maelstrom of cigarette exhaust adulterated the fragrant Hawaiian air. He sensed Itachi's presence from behind him.

He held up his lighter behind him and a burst of flame dazzled from it in the moonlit darkness. With his brother's cigarette now lit, he pocketed the device. Itachi's smog converged with his own; the two smokey, cloudy friends gamboled into the night, thinning out the further they danced. The siblings stayed uncommunicative for some time until the oldest perforated the quiet, humid atmosphere with a whimsical tone of voice.

Itachi only manipulated his voice like that when he was goading Sasuke on.

"She's quite charming, isn't she?" Itachi quizzed to no one in particular. He made it seem like it was just the inner ramblings of an infatuated man, because he looked up at the natural satellite of the earth suspended in the sky, not expecting an answer from anyone.

"Indeed, Ino is an attractive girl," Sasuke vocalized, not taking Itachi's bait. The female Itachi was confessing about was a peculiar subject that Sasuke wanted to eschew from talking about with him. He knew from the start that Itachi found Sakura appealing and that he would romantically partner with her if he had the chance, but Sasuke purloined the opportunity from him unexpectedly.

It wasn't that Sasuke was purposefully avoiding discourse involving her, it was just that it was nonessential to his feelings, nor could Itachi do anything about the situation now. Sakura was extraneous to his emotions, and could easily be left out of whatever conversation Sasuke was in, unless it was about making Sakura extremely mad. Before he could receive a retort from Itachi, Sasuke spoke.

"Your relationship with her wasn't the way you and her told it," Sasuke said, effectively interupting whatever rejoin Itachi would deliver to him next. He didn't want to hear his brother's taunts, and decided to deflect the subject back on him.

"How vulgar. She was only a child when we met. I'm ashamed of you, little brother," Itachi exhaled a hazy breath.

"You're the vulgar one. I was simply saying that babysitting was a farce of an excuse to come up with to cover up your true relations," Sasuke said.

"You were obviously implying something more of a carnal nature between us," Itachi inhaled the bolting smoke right back into his mouth. He sloped his elbows on the patio banister, craning his head to face his little brother. His eyes were imbued with an emotion that Sasuke couldn't quite make out. Sasuke followed his gaze back out to the lapping ocean; his eyes first indicated to him the distinct feminine and male footprints in the sand, and as he traced them to the architects who created them, he was unsurprised to find Sakura capering about by the sea's source in an uncouthly fashion.

"Nobody is impervious to the salacious looks you give her daily," Sasuke said, lethargically dragging his eyes around the girl's clumsy twirling form from below. Sakura was slender and small, a would be blessing to a towering gymnast like Sasuke. She wasted her physique as he watched her fall from a turn into the sand below, and discerned with his ears a bubble of laughter from her. She chose to stay in the gritty particles and construct a sand castle instead of getting back up again.

Suigetsu rose from the water and leveled the plinth of her sand mansion. Sakura shouted at the shark-like boy, abrubtly standing and booting a fair amount of beach into his face.

"Sakura is basically impervious to the lustful looks anyone gives her, which is all that matters. I wouldn't want to be her innocence's undoing if I pulled something on her, and I expect the same of you. Don't play with her," Itachi said, quelling the cigarette out with his bare heel.

"Is that an ultimatum?" Sasuke asked, crushing his stick with his heel as well.

"It's not a threat. It's a strong preferance."

"I don't follow you around like a puppy dog anymore, Itachi. I'll do what I want. And if at some low point in my life I want Sakura, I'll take her in any way I please."

Itachi showed his distaste for his brother's revelation with a small frown and a head shake, and went back inside after thieving one more look towards the pair playing by the Pacific Ocean. Sasuke lingered a while longer on the balcony, sharply observing Sakura's smooth, willowy legs frisking about the water's edge. She was clad in billowy shorts which made the appendages he was transfixed with more drawn-out and svelte.

He fixedly decided to have another smoke, because he was feeling extremely stressed at the upcoming competition, obviously.

It certainly wasn't because Sasuke thought his makeup artist's exposed legs were killer.

* * *

A different shade of dark established itself in the tropical land; it was the night of the tournament, and Sakura could almost reach out her hands and tangibly feel the anxiety in the air of her group and Sasuke's members as they weaved themselves to their respective rooms. Sakura laced herself through the gymnast and coach mob to try to locate a door with Sasuke's name on it. She knew Sasuke was waiting inside, as he was the first to be drawn and put in the upcoming match.

She heard the warble of a loud speaker. The emphatic, manly voice radiating from it instructed that the makeup artists had 20 minutes to find their gymnasts, and then 2.5 hours to complete their presentations on the performing gymnasts before the first set would compete. After time was up, coaches would seek out their trainees and shepherd them to the heart of the nature made stadium.

After sweeping almost every entrance she could see, she finally unearthed the door, noting the striking print his name was engraved with. The other doors she scanned through were nowhere near as eye-catching or prominent. She wrung the knob gently and was overwhelmed with the sight arranged in front of her.

After days of fasting, his body was much more delineated than before.

Helplessly, Sakura's eyes were led down to Sasuke's naked torso. They first started on his swan-like neck, which flowed into arched shoulder blades with elongated collarbones. A distinct pack of 6 muscles marbled his stomach, along with a complimentary v shape where his hipbones formed at. Her face went febrile with hot red embarrassment. Sakura was not oblivious to the fact that her client was a human sculpture that an innumerable amount of girls would have fawned over. Before her eyes could voyage any further downwards, Sakura pivoted quickly to face the door, standing rigidly comical.

"I'm going shirtless the whole competition, so you'll have to turn around eventually," Sasuke said from behind her, ruffling what sounded like clothes to Sakura.

"Nonetheless, I thought knocking was a basic human function. I'm impressed at your complete lack of civility," Sasuke recommenced. Sakura felt her face grow more feverish at his wordly prods and decided to counter with some of her own; she revolved back around and was more even more bewildered that Sasuke had taken off more clothes. He was clad only in light, khaki colored shorts with a white drawstring now.

Sakura systematized herself together and took a few steps forward only to be impeded by an exasperated hand block from Sasuke. Her face had evacuated the crimson from it's skin and she was now just perplexed at the unexpected motion.

"What you're wearing isn't acceptable to my team, or society on that note" Sasuke claimed. He plucked unadorned but still exposing pieces of clothing off the back of the chair facing the mirror and held it in front of her. Sakura perceived that the fragments of the articles wouldn't cover enough as she'd like, so she shook her head in reply. They looked tight as well.

"Like I said, if you wanted the fashion and makeup, you should've chose Ino. Do I have to repeat it again so you'll understand better?" was Sakura's riposte.

"I hoped that maybe you'd miraculously come to your senses within the past day and realize what you've been wearing doesn't flatter your body shape," Sasuke said. Sakura scoured his face and eyes for any evidence that the statement was his version of a compliment but found none; all she procured from his expression was idle indifference to if she chose it or not. Then again, the Uchihas had never been good at expressing their feelings, much less letting them transpire on their faces.

"At all."

Sasuke drifted towards her with that uncanny gymnast sophistication he carried with him and somehow she ended up in front of the full length mirror within a few steps as he backed her up by it. He positioned himself behind her. Sakura viewed his tall, barren form in the mirror expectantly as he looked back into the glass with her. He began a succession of eye paths down her body, sometimes stopping on a particular part, and then spoke.

"You've got such an impressive, tight little body that it's shameful to hide it from a crowd of partygoers and perfomers, much less the general world."

Maybe it was the balmy air in Sasuke's private room that was filtered in by the nearby sweltering beaches, but Sakura's physique altered into a smoldering mess at Sasuke's concession. His eyes never concluded their chain down her body even when he was talking. Sakura combated the compulsion to eclipse his eyes from roaming her form anymore, but that would be giving in to his strategy.

Sasuke was referring to the age old adulation strategy to coax Sakura into doing what he wanted. It was highly probable that this method was successful with all the other girls he performed it on, but Sakura wasn't buying into his hoodwinking ways. She may be a reddening disarray in front of him, but she too could play this game, and hopefully irritate him in the process. She restrained her embarrassment.

Sakura was not to be made a fool out of by Sasuke Uchiha.

"You know, Sasuke... I only hide it because I'm saving it for the eyes of that striking young man to come along and sweep me off my feet," Sakura said, steadily turning her body to come face to face with him. Sasuke's face flickered surpisingly for a moment, but it rapidly composed itself again as she forced him to move back towards a flower printed couch with an unfaltering stalk.

"The tall, dark, and handsome man with the charcoal hair and ebony eyes, that one. He's got a gorgeous smile, and if he'd do it more often, I'd certainly fall in love with him," Sakura continued, accumulating a great distance while Sasuke was losing his to her. She allowed the loose Hawaiian long sleeve to fall precariously onto one of her shoulders, divulging to his eyes a smooth piece of arm with the white strap of a tank top underneath.

"He's got an imposing gymnast body, ridged with muscles," she said, and Sasuke's bare calves impacted the back of the couch. With that sentence, she extended her hand and daintily pushed against the rock hard surface of his stomach so that Sasuke fell onto the couch she had strided him against. With the shirt dangerously hanging off already, Sakura decided to take it off slowly and completely as he watched her. She gauged Sasuke's reaction before she continued her razz with him.

His eyes were pervaded with insouciance as usual, with his lids in their traditional hooded form. A minuscule tinge of what appeared to be mirth and covet colluded with the apathy in the contradicting cocktail of his eyes. He undeniably wasn't against whatever Sakura was doing because he permitted her to lead him onto the couch. She internally deliberated whether or not to get inappropriately close to Sasuke, but chose against it. She didn't want to take this chaff too far; if she straddled him, there might be adverse consequences. Sakura bent her body down, putting a knee in between his legs and settling her hands on the arms of the couch.

"The man has to have sharp, high cheekbones," Sakura removed one hand from the arm to sketch faint lights over his features with a finger.

"And an aristocratic edge to his jaw," her fingers dipped down to trace the outline of his jaw.

"But most importantly, he has to have full, velvety, kissable lips," Sakura said, ascending her fingers back up to his mouth. She parted his lips with them and slid a finger to the underside of the bottom lip. Sakura didn't elicit a response from Sasuke with this; he remained amused, and let her do what she wanted to him.

"And there's only one way to find out if those two latter adjectives are true."

Sakura lowered her head cautiously to Sasuke's, only inches of heated air partitioning their mouths. She leaned more treacherously close to his parted and awaiting lips.

"Too bad your brother isn't here to verify my assumptions."

Sasuke smiled smugly at her duplicitous act. Sakura's eyes broadened at the recognition that he knew what she was going to pull on him all along; Sasuke wrenched her onto his lap and detained her hips with his hands. Sakura went red and knew that this wasn't her game anymore, and that they were treading a dangerous, taunting line between a playful jest and serious consequences. Sasuke submitted to her an small, open teethed grin before rendering her completely immobile with his words and his hands.

"Then perhaps Itachi and I could tag team you. We fundamentally inhabit the same bodies; you don't even have to look at me. I'll take you from behind," Sasuke said, flicking up too fast for Sakura to register; he had dumbed her down with his confounding statement.

He lightly pressed her body into the cushiony couch. He caged her small frame in with his lengthy hands upon the couch arms from behind her. Sasuke could feel the hotness from her form emanating to the top of her head, and he compressed his body against hers closer. He made no more contact with her than that. Sasuke thoroughly had his makeup artist in tyrannical clutches. He commanded her with steely, hushed words.

"Sakura, put the clothes on."

She quavered at his tone; that was the first time he had called her by her name. She looked for the outfit and found it draped over the couch he imprisoned her on. The presently reprobate boy leaning behind her nudged her closer to it. She shook her head and Sasuke gently shoved her further with his body.

"You lost this little ruse of yours to me. The least you can do for putting me through such an exasperating act is to do this."

Sakura capitulated her defeat. Sasuke had a point, but he was the one who instigated the flattery to begin with. She groaned and extracted the black outfit from the couch's top. He unfettered her figure from his lean arms and turned around to face the wall.

"Calm down. My eyes are closed," Sasuke said to her. She wasn't solaced at this fact, because why would Sasuke give her the decorum and time of day to contemplate her feelings that way? Primitively after her defeat, she undertook the great task of settling the figure-hugging clothes safely onto her body. It zipped in quirky places that Sakura wasn't sure which piece was the top or bottom. After zipping up the last of the maddening outfit, Sasuke turned back around to face her. Sakura collected a neighboring projectile and threw it at him.

He anticipated this, and he sidestepped it effortlessly and glided to his designated chair in front of the mirror where Sakura would work on his face. He sat in in nimbly, with that smug smile still stuccod on his face.

"The heels for that outfit are in the corner," Sasuke had the audacity to say. With her mouth agape, she looked at the direction he sloped his head towards. A pair of black stilettos clustered the room's edge.

"I wouldn't try to swing at me again. You need to start doing your job," Sasuke said. The bellow of the overhead speaker, this time the one that was in his private room, let the makeup artists know that the 20 minutes of navigating to their gymnasts room was up, and that it was time to begin their presentations.

* * *

Sasuke observed the girl in the mirror finalize her work with a seemingly impenetrable amount of setting mineral powder. Sakura had composed herself enough to do a distinguished job on him.

They gazed at eachother through the mirror; Sakura still donned that infuriated expression, but it was milder, because that was hard to keep up for 2.5 hours. Even though the anger towards him caked over all the other emotions on her face, Sasuke could tell she looked gratified in her handiwork.

He blinked and his eyes moved to his mirror produced manifestation. Sasuke looked like a human exhibition of a volcanic inferno, his most prominent features powdered with a discreet coat of light red underneath the top of the heavier makeup. His lids wore a jacket of Pacific scarlet fused with tropical gold, flaring out in the same digree with a line of thin, modest eye liner. Flaxen gold stained his lips and harmonized well with the tan contour rushing towards the corners of them. The markings and bites on his neck were mopped over with a copying concealer that blended into his collarbones.

He made eye contact with his makeup artist in the mirror once again and inclined his head.

"It's acceptable," Sasuke said. He arose from the chair and lengthened his limbs, awaiting the reverberation of the speaker to address he and his opponent, He heard Sakura groan from behind him and a stuck zipping sound of clothing.

"That wasn't fair of you," Sakura said, and the zipping sound turned more irritated.

"You played with me first, and gave me an entryway to get that outfit on you," Sasuke said nonchalantly, elongating his legs against the wall and not looking at her.

"That was unprincipled of you, though, to use the force of boy against me. Why do I even need to wear these constricting clothes anyways? They're impractical for watching. I won't be performing," Sakura said, finally zipping up the last bit of the back of the top.

"Also, I'm going to punch you in the face when we get back to Japan. I can't ruin your face right now, which is unfortunate."

"So, what, that'll be the second time in a few days you start something you can't finish?"

Sakura catapulted a stiletto towards his chest and he dodged it. He let out an amused exhale. The speaker flipped on and publicized Sasuke and another boy's names as the first to rival each other. Someone tapped on the door, and Sasuke and Sakura walked to it. Itachi was on the other side, and Sakura blushed excessively. Sasuke knew that she ruminating about the comment he had made to her on the couch. Itachi looked inquisitively at Sakura, and then to Sasuke. His eyes turned hard when he reached his brother.

Itachi gave Sasuke his performance whips, and walked them up to the foresty arena. A large crowd had conglomerated together by the nature filled, tiki torch lighted arena, and they enlivened the plantation with their cheers and hollers.

Sakura spoke to him before he departed.

"Even though I hate you, Sasuke, I'll still root for you."

Sasuke glanced back at her impassively, but had the smirk he wore while they were in his dressing room. Everyone watched as Sasuke glided up to the elevated, bamboo platform with another boy. The boy had two bamboo poles in one hand, and Sasuke had two lashes in his. They shook hands, and retreated to their respective quarters.

A trio of judges, situated at the front of the platform on a rostrum, gesticulated the performance start with three simultaneous hands raises towards the boys.

 _Authorr's Note: Thanks for those who pmed me and reviewed saying to get well. :o that's so sweeeet of ya'll. Anyways here's chap 7! Feel kinda weird about this one, because Sasuke was so forceful with that scene, but he wanted to make it a point that Sakura couldn't mess with him, but he could mess with Sakura. Sasuke is the most asshatty Uchiha._

 _UPDATE:!_

 _Okay so I received quite a lot of flames from I assume the same person for this chapter. I will address said flames in the next chapter, but I did feel that the flamer had a point. The undressing scene was so weird and unusual for me to write; forgive me, I'm a first time writer. I make mistakes. Here is the new and cleaner version. It still contains your typical forceful Sasuke, but it is wayyyy more appropriate. Here is the new and improved version. :)_

 _The new parts are after the first horizontal line towards the bottom before another horizontal line. Enjoy guys, and again I'm sorry. ^^_


	8. Clueless Amateur

**Chapter 8**

An imaginary line sundered two distinct groups of people up, and they each tended to gravitate towards their area and cheer for their respective friend or teammate. That was, until the boy and Sasuke resolved their performances with a coincident bow to the crowd and judges. After the referees affirmed that Sasuke was the victor of that match up, a few of the opposing troupe descended into an undomesticated mass, dishing out disparage and swarming the zone of Sasuke's supporters.

Sakura had just narrowly darted below a Hawaiian fruit of sorts that was hurled towards her by the aforementioned before a familiar body phantom behind her. From the fieriness of the body diffusing from behind her, she guessed that it was the winner of the match. Sasuke's exterior was customarily chilled, but in the conclusion of the performance, his skin trickled with hot sweat.

The gymnast had begun to turn clammy when he stood on the dais's edge and conducted an exemplary double layout, coiling the two fire whips on all sides of his body in the air before anchoring a copybook landing with his hands up. He performed the same move again but backwards, emulating the same posture and position as the forward one; Sasuke even echoed the identical, meticulous motions of the snake like whip. He landed on the precise area where he had executed the first double layout.

Unquestionably, the three assessors were overawed with the acrobat's distinct facsimile style. The boy had an almost inhuman aptitude to duplicate any exigent twist, tuck, layout, pike, and anything else physically taxing in a perfect, consecutive row. Sasuke's competitor was deficit in such individualistic moves, and had lost because he was unable to compete with such a singularity.

The steamy air gusting in from the Pacific Ocean in addition to the fire breathing from the whips were also two big contributing factors to Sasuke's moisture drenched body. Even dispatching an elementary front tuck was a coup with the night's humidity assaulting his active form.

Sakura turned around to distinguish Sasuke's withdrawing form, enlightened vaguely by the blazes of the elephantine tiki torches flecking the arena perimeters and jungle made pathways. She acted on her indignation from earlier, wanting to beat up Sasuke for what happened earlier in a nice, tranquil environment, but was hampered by the gentle grip of Itachi on her wrist. She turned back and faced him; he pointed towards Suigetsu who scaled the stairs to ascend to the bamboo platform.

"Sasuke left because he didn't want to cause commotion during Suigetsu's match. Following him will only lead the crowd who are sore with him to you two. You don't exactly sport the noiseless grace we do," Itachi said with a small smile. Sakura nodded resentfully.

"He's also resting. There's many more brackets in the competition, and I have no doubt that Sasuke will be one of the last ones to compete."

Itachi renounced his clamp on her wrist, and she adjoined to his side to marvel at Suigetsu's flowing, water like motions up on the Pacific soapbox. The rabble had calmed themselves, and Sakura thought they looked like they were being beuilged into sleep by his placid and skillfull fluctuations. The blue haired boy performed nothing like his wonted self; he was a whole different being up there.

The customary Suigetsu obeyed no one, brashly acted out in accordance to his feelings, and exploited his acrobatic finesse to tease people. The person up there yielded to the changeable transit of his limbs, listened warily to what his body was telling him, and manipulated his sleek and talented form to mollify the previously outraged spectators into a still trance. He had nowhere near Sasuke's expertise, but he had his own brand of methodical, watery moves that made him stand out from the entrant next to him. The judges beheld idiosyncrasy in a gymnast as more valuable than just plain forte.

Suigetsu reverted back to his old self as he basked in the triumph of the ending match, blowing kisses to the females in the crowd. He descended to where Itachi and Sakura were standing and whorled his arms around the pair.

"The rest of the team is in the other venue. We need to head over there so we don't miss them," the winner vocalized to them, promenading them to the pathway Sasuke took after he won.

"Also, Sakura, you look smokin'. What kind of tricks did Sasuke pull to get that little skirt on you?"

Sakura burned up and swatted the query away with a quick gesture of her hand, not offering him a rejoinder. She never did answer Suigetsu's question.

* * *

The night was infringing upon the AM spectrum. Enraptured bystanders circulated with the numerous, dejected, second place aerialists. The aerialists took their place as common onlookers in place of being present on the high, caned platform they performed on as skilled, but not skilled enough to persist on the stage, acrobats. Itachi opted to not perform, choosing instead to assist his team as their coach, so he shifted ever presently in the swelling crowd. Among the failed gymnasts were Deidara and Gaara.

Deidara suffered a minor tumble during his 12th match while implementing a risky, sprinting back walkover which was enough for the judges to penalize and eliminate him. Sasuke had eye witnessed the falter in the secondary, extra shift Deidara mistook on his hands which cost him his event. The man Deidara was against had gotten eliminated in the next match he took, which probably consoled Deidara a bit since his conqueror was vacant from the competition now.

Sasuke had spectated no mistake on Gaara's part, but knew that the red head was beset with a master entrant not unlike himself. They had pitched the 17 year old against a 35 year old, which was a major disadvantage in itself. Both gymnasts applied the same tranquilly serious techniques to their movements; however, Gaara's opponent was infinitesmally more supple than him. Gaara had no difficulty executing a perfect split, but struggled slightly with aerial cartwheels, especially side ones. Without the use of his hands, his legs couldn't, or wouldn't disperse themselves in the air. Pliability was a staple checkmark on the clipboards of the judges.

Neji wrapped up his routine on the stage with a triple pike, one of the hardest stunts to be done in gymnastics on a hard floor. Sasuke considered Neji to be more of a dancer than a gymnast, but he conceded that his triple pike was flawlessly done. Hinata's cousin twisted and spun more than he did flipped, and Sasuke suspected that's why the judges announces that the other man was the winner. Nonetheless Neji had elegance and poise that Sasuke silently revered. Neji amalgamated with the group inaudibly; Deidara clapped him on the back.

Gaara and Neji had faced the same red headed opponent and lost.

Suigetsu and himself were the last of his team to compete. One of them had to come out on top. The cycle placed Suigetsu next, paired with Gaara and Neji's conqueror. His name was Sasori and Sasuke had once mistook him from behind for Gaara because their reddish hair illuminated together in the same shade of the moonlight and totem pole flames.

"Wish me luck, brother. This guy is scary. Why is he even here, anyways? This guy is almost middle aged," Suigetsu conveyed to Sasuke. Sasuke let a small, exasperated breath out of his nose.

"Shouldn't that make it easier for you, then? A tenuous old man against an able-bodied teenager?" Sasuke posed the scenario to him more clearly. Suigetsu's violet eyes shimmered subtly, and he cased Sasuke in his arms with a magnificent bear hug. Sasuke remained still, longing for the moment to be over. The boy liberated him after a few seconds and bore his maw full of acute incisors.

"That is the closest I'll ever get to a commendation from you. I need to preserve the moment for a while longer," Suigetsu said. After 5 seconds of Suigetsu and Sasuke staring at each other in the silence of the crowd, Suigetsu vaulted up the steps to face and shake hands with Sasori. The taciturn crowd metamorphosed into an ear-splitting miscellany of both gymnast and average civilians.

Two gymnasts on the same team couldn't compete with eachother. If Suigetsu won this round, Sasuke would go against Sasori and if Sasuke lost, Sasori would be declared the winner. In a context like this where one out of two remaining team members went up against the last opposing force and won, the other member would be paired with the losing force. If he lost, then the opposing force would win. It was a precarious circumstance and unfair to both parties, but it stood valid nonetheless. The three arbitrators cued that the rendtion start with their traditional, concurrent arm raises.

At the cue, Sasuke sidled throughout the seat of spectators to where Sakura stood with his brother. She was inspirited by Suigetsu's performance, and made no note of the swiveling throng of people behind her because of her un-diverted attention to the stage. Sasuke gently shoved three collateral bodies towards her with his shoulder, knowing that Sakura would take the necessary strides forward to ensure that the 3 particular rowdy individuals behind her wouldn't push up against her again. She hadn't even turned around to confront them before stepping closer to the stage, still letting all of her attention fall to her tumbling friend on the stage. Sasuke ghosted behind Sakura.

Sasuke nonchalantly tripped a girl in a hula skirt which caused her to fall onto Sakura. Sakura moved forward again, forcing her to inch towards the first wave of the crowd. The gymnast completed his goal with a hard nudge to a young man wearing a pink polo. He blundered into Sakura, efficaciously shoving her to the very front of the crowd. She almost touched the elevated platform with her proximity.

Sasuke stayed on the margins of the cheering crowd after gliding through them. Sasuke looked up at the two gymnasts. As Sasori implemented a double side somi, he made eye contact with Sasuke. A fake, self-effacing smile materialized on his childlike face. The black haired boy knew what that grin meant; Suigetsu was about to be put out of the show.

Sasuke had clashed with Sasori before. He was only 13 back then, and had gone without Itachi's knowledge to an underground match with adults. He wanted to prove to himself that he could rival professional full-grown people. As Sasuke advanced, quickly beating the opponents underneath Sasori to get to him, he was unreservedly quelled by him. Sasuke had never expected to encounter Sasori again, because he had abandoned himself in the protection performance enhancers as opposed to hard work to get where he was. Sasuke knew how Sasori had passed the drug tests.

Sasori was such a locally acclaimed acrobat that he had ingress to all kinds of contemporary gym candies, pumpers, and other illicit performance augmenters. The more up-to-the-minute the drugs were, the harder it was to detect them in the performer's system. The chemical composition of a steroid could be rejiggered into a totally newfangled substance, imperceptible to the tests the gymnasts were subjected to, with identical enhancing effects.

Sasori decimated the competition with the same move that he had foisted onto Sasuke 5 years ago. He conducted an Amanar vault without a higher ledge to push himself up on. It was as perfect as Sasuke could recall; he stuck the landing with firm, bare feet. Nobody but him could perform the vault without a ledge, except Sasori.

It was an instinctive win for the red head. The mob went feral, and Suigetsu morosely accepted his fate. The judges hadn't even settled the winner, but everyone knew that Suigetsu couldn't compete with that move. Sasori seemed to elude gravity with how high he could catpult himself up in the air.

Sasuke wondered if Sasori knew that he could perform a better Amanar vault.

* * *

Sakura was positioned at the anterior of the crowd, and to her surprise, she found that she didn't mind much. It was inevitable with the elbowing of the gestated multitude. She looped a sympathetic arm through Suigetsu's. Everything was silent as Sasuke and the man coasted towards each other to meet in the middle. She could hear the oscillations of the sweet smelling coconut palms in the mellow zephyr of Hawaii.

The man, who had hair not unlike Gaara's, was asked by one judge if he wanted or needed a quick break before facing off against Sasuke. The allotted time for the last match of the whole tournament was a hefty 4 minutes. The competitors would almost be in perpetually motion throughout the unabridged performance. Sasori shook his head and expressed to Sasuke a sly smile that Sakura was uncomfortable with.

"Do you both remember the specific prerequisites for this match?" the judge inquired through the microphone, his voice vociferous with the aid of the device. They both nodded and shook hands.

"What does he mean by specific prerequisites? I thought everything was the same all across the board," Sakura asked and prodded Itachi with her arm, not looking away from Sasuke.

"Sasuke and the man up there, Sasori, are required for the finale to pull someone out of the crowd and perform with them for the last half of their routine. It shows the judges that they're able to manipulate two bodies efficiently, not just one," Itachi said, also not looking away from his brother. His eyes trailed from Sasuke to Sasori; they stood on the extremities of the platform, evidently ready to vault into something lengthy and difficult from their fringed position and stance.

"The person can't be a gymnast for obvious reasons, and they'll both probably choose someone who looks amateur to make themselves look more skilled while flipping with them."

Sakura contemplated the sine for the denouement of the tournament.

"Isn't that practically impossible with a _clueless amateu_ r?"

"If they've made it to the final 2, I don't think it will be beyond their level of skill."

Sakura was pleased that Sasuke had made it to the finals. His makeup never deliquesced into the sweat that dripped from his face onto the stage after every match he completed. He looked just as handsome and clean as he did the very first match.

It made no difference how much she hated him, she had to acknowledge that her gymnast was a bang-up acrobat. It was no wonder that he demanded a first-rate makeup artist; if Sakura had Sasuke's virtuosity, she would probably demand such a thing too.

The infamous arm raises of the assessors signaled to Sasori and Sasuke and the audience below. The pink headed makeup artist's mouth went agape as the two immediately plunged into that toilsome looking vault Sasori had ended the rendition between him and Suigetsu with. Sasuke's version was cleaner from what Sakura's untrained eye could discern, but then again, she was just a _clueless amateur._ They landed with pointed toes on the edge of their designated, lined areas, never entrenching on their opponent's precinct. Sakura switched her view to Sasuke when they no longer started implementing the same moves on each other.

"Sasuke and Sasori will be using the same fire whips," Suigetsu mumbled and pointed to the objects to the left of them.

"They'll use them in the second half of the performance," Itachi added on to Suigetsu's thoughts.

Sasuke back flipped backwards twice until he was about 1/4 the distance from the end of the bamboo platform and stuck his hands up quickly, put them back down quickly, and stuck them back up to turn his slender, air born body up in the air. He touched his knees and landed with a painful looking split that was opposite the way he had started at. He slid his legs together again to duplicate the exact same thing. The crowd voiced their admiration for Sasuke through name chants and general praise.

"That was called an Arabian flip, Sakura," Suigetsu said, lightening up a little bit since he came second to Sasori. His voice was cheerier than before.

"Which is easy. Sasuke is just warming up."

From then on, Sasuke was just a Pacific cyclone of rapid movements too fast for Sakura's eyes. Even Itachi and Suigetsu were having trouble keeping up with his swiftness of his strenuous, breathtaking moves. Sasori wasn't fazed, and kept up with Sasuke's pace.

Triple front flips, triple back flips, triple aerials, triple pikes, triple handsprings; no matter what move was being done, two more had to be precisely added on to it. The boyish twisters terminated their performance when a glaring, ringing buzz resounded through the Pacific jungle like forest. Their first two minutes were up, and it was time for them to select a random person from the crowd to perform with.

Sasuke and Sasori contemporaneously snatched their fire whips up, lit them, and, with the tempo of lightning, advanced towards the crowd. Before Sakura could react, her gymnast lunged down, extended his arm towards her, and robbed her from the crowd. Her mind turned into a whirlwind when he set her daintily on the stage. She looked down fleetingly at Sasuke's teammates awestruck faces. Everything seemed so small-scale from up in the spotlight.

Sakura felt like she was in a reverie; Sasuke couldn't have possible chosen her for a partner. Her whirlwind of a mind abated when Sasuke put his hand on the small of her back and quietly said something atypical of him, though with no emotion staining his voice, then he shot her with a great force into the air.

"I'll keep you safe."

And even through the hazy reality that Sasuke had stolen her from the audience unbeknownst to her prior knowledge, she did feel safe. Sasuke wouldn't say something that aberrant without having a reason.

As she diverged into the air from the safety of the ground, she felt the tongues of fire from Sasuke's whips lick the clothes on her back. The whips preceded to tornado around her free falling form. Sakura tuned in to the celestial beings in the black and clouded sky before descending back down to the earthly ground. She again came into contact with a supernal spirit, but unlike the heavenly sky, he was tangible. The fiery god's arms caught her and launched her into a vortex of swirls that he encased all around with the ribbons of the hot whips. He performed many complex and quick moves with one hand, using the other one to encircle his makeup artist and guide her to where they would both end up.

Sakura had noticed when the now white whip had circumscribed her in the air, she felt no hotness even when it belted her clothes with the tip slightly. After Sakura landed in the area he had planned, he curved one arm into her two and completed three back tucks with her plastered to his back, lashing the volcanic hot whip around them gracefully throughout the remainder of the move. When the whip dashed onto her skirt and the skirt hadn't been been singed, full realization came to mind.

The outfit he had forced onto her was fire-resistant.

Sasuke wasn't egotistical enough to put Sakura in harm's way; he apparently considered that there was a microscopic chance he could mess up during the performance, and took all the precautions to guard Sakura from the fire of his whips. That's why Sasuke was so insistent in getting it onto her. He probably hadn't wanted to do it in such a risqué fashion, but she knew that he hadn't wanted to disclose to her that he had planned to pick her even before he and Sasori faced off together.

She looked to Sasuke's adversary, serenely noting that the female he nominated from the sweltering crowd had no such safe guard.

Though she would never forgive her gymnast for the ribald way he went about getting the clothes on her without alerting to her his hidden intentions, Sakura really did appreciate the uncommunicative gesture. If he had told her about his premeditations beforehand, she would spend the whole performance restless and overwrought. Right now Sakura felt like a lightweight being, free of worries in contrast to her established, graceless, and perfectionist self. With the cognizance that she wouldn't get burned, Sakura relaxed and let Sasuke project and flip her to heights that only birds knew.

Side aerial after side aerial and Sakura felt so ebullient. She was a marionette in his hands, dallying around until the next thing he plunged her into. Unbeknownst to her, from the turnout of the Hawaiin tournament below, they looked so beautifully corybantic and alluringly wild.

Sakura hadn't registered the roaring rallies from the audience until her peripheral distinguished Sasuke bowing beside her. He obtained the trophy from the staggered judges and was flocked by his teammates. Suigetsu clutched Sakura from below like Sasuke had done, and towed her to his congratulating faction.

When Sakura's adrenaline spiked mind regained its' composure, she wondered why Sasuke had made her wear those provocative high heels. They weren't fire-proof. Sakura hadn't believed his compliment towards her body because he was just utilizing flattery to get her into the clothes, but Sasuke really did think her body was pleasant.

Especially her legs.

Even he wasn't above the onslaught of the testosterone imbued hormones.

 _Author's Note: I am proud to say I received my very first flame. They were obviously from the same person; I received them minutes in between with the same grammatical style. Let me canvass over everything you said, dear flamer._

 _1: "why the fuck does sasuke have to wear make-up?"_

 _This is literally the premise of the whole story. He has to wear it because as a recognized, professional gymnast, appearances are a major checkmark for many judges. In this story, Sasuke performs as not just a regular gymnast, but as one who puts on flair filled shows, if you haven't noticed. Makeup is actually a necessity for showy, talented performers._

 _This applies to real life as well. Have you ever seen an honored male gymnast with less than a raging six pack or a nice smooth face? Especially with the weird, contorting faces that acrobats do when executing a particulary hard move, don't you think a nice coat of makeup really divert their attention to the more positive features of the face?_

 _2: "i don't get it... why did they knock sakura out and then lie about everything?"_

 _"Sakura fell through the air, effectively landing the right temple of her head on a precise corner of the nightstand, which was just enough to arrange short term memory loss for the night. Itachi and Gaara laid Sakura's uncosncious body next to Sasuke's now normally breathing one, not lying her on her side because she was only comatose from shock." Anon, she passed out because she was so overwhelmed with the drastic situation that she tried to help with._

 _Gaara and Itachi lied to both of them to spare Sasuke's pride. I left it up to interpretation._

 _3: "i don't see any chemistry between the two. people are blind and sasuke is just a jerk"_

 _I wasn't aware that Sasuke was jerk. I thought I characterized him as a beautifully wonderful, sweet, compassionate boy with a knack for dancing._

 _Come on, anon. Sasuke tried to kill Sakura in canon._

 _As for the rapey kind of vibes Sasuke gave off in the previous chapter, I changed the whole section up. Go read it so you can know what's going on now. I am only a first time author and have rethought the scene through._

 _I will delete the flames because they are clusterfucking my review feed and are irrelevant to the story now._

 _Enjoy this chapter though, except for you, anonymous flamer. You can enjoy building another inferno around another person's story on your perpetually recurrent lonely nights. I love you guys, except for you flamer. n.n_


	9. Domino Effect

**Chapter 9**

True to her word, Sakura did indeed highlight the exact statement of the contract for him. Prior to Sasuke's competition win, she avowed that deep within the contract, it had an explicit testimonial saying that it "okay, great even, for Sakura Haruno to use bright colors on Sasuke Uchiha's face." She didn't just want to utilize plain old black and white makeup throughout the duration of their partnership, and back in Hawaii, with his vibrant, fiery pigments, he looked wonderful.

She used a broken green crayon to add the statement onto the borders of the contract.

As she handed it to her gymnast, she saw what looked like droll dimples appear on his cheeks. They de-materialized so quickly that Sakura thought they might not have been there at all. He scanned it over again, the conceivable gaiety evaporating from his face to form archetypal apathy.

"Why am I letting a six year old finger paint on my face?" Sasuke asked, and discerned a sullied green crayon sticking out of her jean pocket. He contemplated pilfering it from her to mark it out, scenarios running through his head on how everything with that action could go wrong. He put the hand not holding the paper in his pocket and handed the contract back to her. Sakura fished the childish utensil out of her pocket upon receiving it.

"And," Sakura brought the crayon to the paper, inserting a squiggly arrow into a paragraph a few lines down, "Sasuke Uchiha will praise my remarkable prowess and-"

Sasuke dislodged the crayon out of her hand and seized the contract, not letting Sakura go any further. She dived to get it back but with no effect; she was no rival to his acrobatic rapidity. Lunging again at Sasuke, she had him pinned against the wall of his apartment. His teammates and her group's eyes weren't vigilant to their little divertissement in the kitchen, instead focusing on the TV and playing games in the living room. A large, marbled kitchen island separated the teasing pair from the living room. Music blasted throughout the suites and rooms.

They had all just gotten back from Hawaii, and a few specific males had encouraged the females to come to their apartment for an unwinding evening at their place. The girls had merited it; they had done sensational jobs on them. Flower crowns, tiki necklaces, vivid Hawaiian shirts, and tan hula skirts disordered the extensive apartment upon their arrival. Pizza was ordered, as the gymnasts could now stop fasting. Their next vying was in a week, and wasn't as monumentally important as their prior one.

He gripped it loosely above her head, reverting to the boyish method of using height difference on a girl to hold something out of her reach. As always with this juvenile modus operandi, the girl leapt to thieve it from him, knowing that it was to no avail but still doing it anyways. Sasuke's eyes coursed down to her bouncing form. He held the crayon higher above Sakura's head. She observed his wandering eyes and ceased her bounding.

"You're childish and a deviant. I didn't know those two words could go together like that, but you've proved me wrong," Sakura said to him. Sasuke remained apathetic and lowered the crayon just enough to let her have an opportunity to try and get it again. An exiguous smirk eventuated on his face at when she took his bait. She glowered at him and then at the crayon.

"I can't not stare. I wasn't lying about my assessment of your body in my dressing room."

Sakura didn't redden like he expected her to. She was too busy prioritizing the colored wax in his hand. Sasuke was taken aback at her obstinacy to get this puerile crayon from him. It was just an elementary game between them, the outcome meaning nothing to either. But from the determined look on her face, Sakura was resolved to thieve it from him nonetheless. It evoked feelings of correlation in him. Even though it was just a trivial game, they both were determined to win. They were too prideful to lose anything, even something as frivolous as this.

Sasuke was preoccupied with his thoughts just enough for Sakura to swipe the utensil from him and dash into the living room, contract in hand. Her laughter floated through the apartment, fading when she reached the living room. Sasuke had caught up with her in a second. But she used Suigetsu as a human escutcheon, hedging herself from him. She knew she was no match for his immediacy when he moved in on her. Suigetsu playfully raised his arms out to screen her even more from him. Everyone was now examining the transaction between Sakura and Sasuke.

"Maybe I should be a gymnast in my downtime," Sakura vocalized, "seeing as how I'm faster than one who does it for a living."

Her tittering faded into the hallways that lead to Sasuke's room. Suigetsu still held his limbs up to protect the girl and it impeded his progress towards her. He scowled at his mate and pushed past him, eyes on Sakura's back. Sasuke wasn't aware of the small smile gracing his lips after the scowl at Suigetsu until his older brother pointed it out to him.

"Why the smile, little one? I thought you weren't one for Sakura's childish games."

Sasuke paused in his pursuit of Sakura and he pivoted slightly to face Itachi. The two siblings engaged in an intense eye lock, and Sasuke was still aware of the many eye pairs around them.

Something inside the younger brother ignited at the way Itachi was gazing at him- like Itachi was asserting his dominance over him and letting him politely know that Sasuke's makeup artist was platonically, and probably romantically, could be his _only_ and that Itachi was the _only_ one who could play Sakura's childish games. The raven haired boy clicked his teeth together and yielded to his passive aggressive half.

"If someone creates a game involving two players, or in some cases _three,_ and I am a contender, I'll always make sure I win."

Sasuke de-materialized into the hallway, shrewdly enjoying the hole being silently burned into his back by his brother. Nobody else knew what the context was behind his statement, which made it so much more satisfying than it already was.

The acrobat wasn't sure why this girl roused such an odd feeling between him and his brother. Sasuke narrowed it down to the typical, good ol' sibling rivalry they've had since they were young- more competitive on Sasuke's part. And Itachi had practically browbeat him about the topic back on their Hawaiian balcony over a cigarette (though Itachi would never say it like that), warning him to stay away from her aside from their business coalition. The younger brother did not abide with something he did not like, in this case Itachi's threat, and would go to extremes to defy Itachi's warnings any chance he could get.

It wasn't like Sasuke was actually trying to _get_ with his makeup artist though; their business was strictly professional and he had a distaste for when feelings merged with business. He only wanted to see how far he could push Sakura and Itachi. So when Itachi speechlessly and vocally made his intentions with Sakura known, Sasuke couldn't help but feel a sense of loathe for him. It was very negligent and amateur of his brother.

It was like a game to Sasuke more than anything. Everything was always a game to him.

Sasuke came upon his door which was shut, but not locked. He had kept it open when he left for Hawaii. Turning the knob marginally, he met no resistance of a body behind the door and sidled in. No lights were on and he resolved to keep them off to cause Sakura to clumsily bump into something and accidentally disclose her position. There weren't many places she could hide in his room; it was a vast expanse of wall and floor with no unneeded bends or differently curved walls she could conceal herself behind. A small giggle resounded and bounced off of the right wall to greet his keen ear.

Unrestrained darkness seeped throughout Sasuke's room; he couldn't see the hand in front of him and instead placed reliance on muscle memory and hearing. He coasted towards the derivative laugh, not surprised when it transferred to the wall over. After Sasuke muffled his already soft footsteps, he knew exactly where Sakura was and bolted to the direction of her trickling laughter. He detected the light touch of the girl's long coat on his jogger clothed leg and reached out to grab whichever article of clothing his hand came into contact with. He instead grasped at empty air.

Another giggle later and Sakura was further away.

The gymnast was, in a weird sense, delighted to find that this darkness enveloped hide and seek match wasn't as easy as he thought it to be. Sakura tripped and he lunged for her and grasped at empty air yet again. The girl was a tiny thing and couldn't have weighed more than a small preteen, so she was able to abscond from his long fingers with the help of the shroud of darkness filtering through his room.

But he knew exactly where she was when a blanket fell off of his bed onto the floor in a quietly cacophonous manner.

Sasuke bolted to the bed and was again, unsurprised when it wasn't by the bed anymore. However he was surprised when it came from right atop of him. Little hands pinned his willowy wrists down to the unmade silk comforter and he could feel her breath tinge his face. Sakura had somehow hopped on top of the bed frame and tackled him from above.

Neither could see each other at all; the air was imbued with excitement and uncertainty, and Sasuke found that he liked it.

Their position radiated sexuality, but even in Sasuke's sex stained mind, it was anything but. It was just Sakura who had again pushed the limits too far in another one of their little games. His mind flashed to the dressing room back in Hawaii, deciding that it was just another one of her tactics to try to win. And she didn't win back in Hawaii.

The ambiance around them instead resembled that of humor and lightheartedness. Anytime Sasuke had been pinned down by a woman in the past, it was simply venereal in nature and sex was always the repercussion. Sakura Haruno was no such case.

Their bodies weren't close, nothing was touching in fact except her hands to his wrists.

His makeup artist was an odd girl; Sakura was practically clueless when it came to men flirting with her, but she turns around and performs frisky, kittenish acts like this to try to get what she wants randomly. Sasuke couldn't rap his head around this walking juxtaposition of a girl. This time instead of her playing along with his game, he played along with hers, mildly interested in seeing where she went with this.

"Obviously I can't outrun you, and I'm cornered. Literally. So this is the tactic I'm forced to resort to. But if anyone were to walk in on us, who would they think won this little game?" Her sweet breath fanned out onto his face.

Their relationship was an offbeat one; they both tried not to touch each other aside from when a little game was going on. Only then was it "okay" to have any sort of physical altercation. Even then, when the altercation occurred, it was always boundary pushing. It was always her or him on top, faces too close for comfort, and there was always provoking banter between the two. It wasn't right. Sasuke and Sakura were too hot-headed to admit defeat so they sometimes blurred the lines between professionalism and sentimentality to not lose.

"I don't care who thinks anything, it's about personal success," Sasuke replied in an insouciant manner. He locked eyes with the flawless blackness swallowing up his room and Sakura's face. Even her bratty colored hair was sheathed by shadowy air.

"Than why do you perform in front of crowds of people, and subsequently judges, who dictate if you won or not according to _their_ standards?" Sasuke blew out a faint breath of air. It might have sounded like a chuckle but nobody could see his expression. She continued.

"If you don't care about appearance, than why did you choose me?"

"If makeup artists weren't mandatory, you wouldn't be on top of me right now."

"But they are, so you must care about appearance to some extent."

"If I am forced to have something, I want the best. It's simple and has nothing to do with a people-pleasing nature," Sasuke said to her. Sakura shifted. She laughed and released her tight seizure on his hollow, pale wrists. Sasuke remained still with his arms still to the sides of his head. He only reached them back up when Sakura began to speak, and he twisted them around to the pockets of her jeans unbeknownst to her.

"That 'six year old finger paint' thing really damaged my ego. I only wanted a compliment and a concession from you. I'm still not giving you the contract, though," Sakura said through a handful of giggles behind her mouth. They still couldn't see each other's expressions.

"Good thing I already have it then, huh," Sasuke simpered. He crinkled the top page to let her know he had fished the rolled up contract out of her back pocket whilst she was talking since nobody could see.

"Good thing I replaced the contract with some random blank pages I found in your room while you were chasing me then, huh?" It would be a lie to say that the gymnast wasn't a little bit incredulous at the fast one Sakura pulled on him.

"I'm going to rip that contract up when I find it," Sasuke said.

"No, you won't. I'm indentured by legal contract and vanity. Kind of like you."

* * *

A party was being thrown at the Uchiha residence the next day in celebration of Sasuke's win for their team, and Sakura of course wanted no part in it. The last time any kind of festivity took place she and Sasuke winded up in the same bed the next morning. A bloom spread across her face every time the thought conjured up in her mind. It was embarrassing, to say the least, at her lack of control over that situation.

And her lack of control over the current situation laid before her now.

With Ino and Karin's hands vised around her wrists, Sakura had no choice but to partake in the party. Everyone else in her team was attending as well so it would appear rude if Sakura wasn't present. But she didn't care about appearing rude, as her gymnast wouldn't care if she was there or not. Additionally, her loitering around Itachi or Suigetsu was out of the question. Ino and Karin would undoubtedly guzzle up all of their time and company.

Sakura tried to make herself feel better by saying that Sasuke's victory was partially due to her skills, so she deserved the revelry just as much as her partner. She still hated parties, though.

Thankfully Sakura did have some semblance of jurisdiction over her outfit for the evening. As much as it contradicted itself, with her being a makeup artist and all, Sakura detested fashion and dressing up. She sported an unembellished, scarlet jacket and a pair of torn up mom jeans with some baby blue flats following it. Hinata was the only girl in their group who looked self-effacing alongside Sakura. With a few head shakes and berates from Ino for selecting to wear something so casual, they were off to their partner's complex.

When they arrived, the evident shambles of the formerly orderly apartment garnered doubts in Sakura's mind. There were already rubber ducks floaties, grills that were now mounted broadside, and side first plastic flamingos in the front yard, of which Sakura could remember the Uchihas having none of those. It was your paradigmatic house party, alright. On an elephantine banner strewn across the largest facet of the apartment, the names "Sasuke and Sakura" were in gaudy, graffiti type print. The word "Congratulations"came prior to it. Someone, obviously not the creator of the banner because of their divergent writing styles, added a vulgar, sexual statement after their names.

Sakura buried her face into her cold hands not wanting to look at it anymore.

"C'mon forehead, don't tell me you _don't_ want that banner to come true," Ino said between obnoxiously vociferous laughs. She guided Sakura to the stairs where a couple was kissing on the banister. Ino wolf whistled which caused them to break apart quickly, and proceeded to lead Sakura up spiraling steps.

"I'll cross out the name Sakura and put Ino in its' place if you don't," Ino's laughing ceased and her tone was now just kittenish and coy. Sakura didn't know how her friend could talk like that almost all of the time. The pink head turned around and found none of the faces of her team. They had gotten lost already. The topmost balcony presented itself to the pair after a few seconds; the apartment door was ajar and was disgorging familiar looking gymnasts, some still in their event attire.

When the svelte aerialists caught wind of the girls they parted to sanction them access to the disheveled insides, then one slumped over against the wall.

Karin had somehow gotten there before them and was talking with Suigetsu over a tall glass of alcohol, while Itachi and Sasuke sat together on the living room couch answering questions from female and male gymnasts alike. A girl perched upon the armrest and snuggled up against her compeer. Their positions gave the impression that her affections were one sided.

Suigetsu evidently couldn't resist the urge to indicate that Sakura was here and he pointed her out to some guys next to him, who in turn pointed her out to the guys next to them and so on. It was a horrifying chain of eyes domino effecting towards her. Having no clue what to do next, she just stiffly offered her spectators an awkward wave. The revelers detonated in one loud clamor of noise and movement. They honed in on her and outstretched their hands to her, clearly wanting some sort of her touch, whether it be a shake or fist bump or anything.

Sakura was uncomfortable, to say the least, at this sort of recognition. This was Sasuke's field of expertise, not hers. She was just the creator, and he was the presenter. Shouts of "congratulations" and "Is that Sakura Haruno", not to mention "Sasuke's girlfriend" were prevalent among the noises that met her ear. The crowd imbided her until an obliging and very welcome hand extended towards her arm and pulled her out of the masses.

Sakura gladly looped her arm in between her savior Itachi's as he walked her to the couch to most likely answer some questions for the news. On their way there Itachi greeted her and told her he was glad to see her and that she had made it here safely. He apologized for the clamorous atmosphere. Ino followed by Itachi. She was placed in the middle when they reached the questionnaires. Their placement was Itachi, Ino, Sakura, and Sasuke, all on a neat row on the couch. Someone in a visor carrying a notepad shooed away Sasuke's adoring fan from the armrest before beginning his array of questions. He started with Sasuke first.

Sakura answered her questions to the best of her abilities, and she answered truthfully. Ino had nothing to be haughty about- her partner hadn't even competed- but still embellished her statements anyways. Ino drank alcohol between each question, even the ones that weren't hers. Sakura wrinkled her nose in repugnance, but was pleased to find that Sasuke had no scent of alcohol at all. It looked like he wouldn't be drinking anything tonight at all.

After all, Sasuke was all or nothing.

After everything was answered accordingly, something dreadful happened.

When the four rose to attend to other things other than questions, a woman with a familiar pink shade staining her lips gave Sakura an execrable stare down as she walked across the floor with Sasuke. She looked older, like she shouldn't be at a high school party, and was perhaps Itachi's age at the most. She had pretty brown hair but an immense bruise spread from her right eye to the tip of her nose to distract Sakura from her nice features. Multiple veins had imploded underneath her skin which lead to severe, disgusting bruising on almost half of her face. Her nose looked to be broken in a myriad of places, most noticeably the bridge. It was grotesquely malformed to the point it seemed to be permanently damaged.

In the few moments before that dreadful thing happened, Sasuke's partner couldn't recollect why the pink lipstick shade stood out to her. There was a sort of mental block preventing her from reminiscing. She looked up at Sasuke's tall form and remembered. Her eyes immediately, as if on command, trailed down to the slender nape of his neck where the love bites had been angrily raging a few days ago.

The girl staring Sakura down had the pink lipstick exactly similar to the smear of pinkish bites and kisses on Sasuke's neck when they woke up together. It assuaged Sakura to know that they weren't somehow hers, that she wasn't the one who had unleashed animalistic marks on Sasuke's neck. So that meant they hadn't done anything in whatever happened that night a few days prior. _This_ was the girl that had done things with Sasuke.

Why was she staring her down, though?

Another mental block presented itself to the pink haired girl. There was something she couldn't remember about the brunette, and it was nettling. Something had happened between the two women, but what was it? Sakura looked down at her knuckles and flexed them.

She seriously couldn't have been the one to cause that much impairment to the woman's, right? And on what account?

Sasuke hadn't noticed the woman and kept steady on his path to the mini bar. Sakura followed him, maintaining immovable eye contact with the brunette. The brunette seemed to prowl towards Sakura like she was some sort of prey. So Sakura stopped and faced her. The woman was gaining momentum and looked absolutely incandescent. Sakura placed a hand on her hip for the encounter, patiently waiting for the confrontation. What she didn't expect, however, was something physical. The woman swung at Sakura.

Sakura barely dodged the fist when another came her way, this time towards her stomach. She darted out of the way again and almost tripped on an object behind her. The loud party music was inundated by Sakura's adrenaline as she darted again and again away from the woman's fleet punches. In a misstep, Sakura tripped this time and fell to the marmoreal floor of the apartment room and was easy prey now.

The girl on the floor sideswiped to knock the woman on the ground with her for an even playing field. It was effective and now they were tumbling around on each other. The woman opted to choose a cowardly route and go for Sakura's pink locks, pulling hard enough to lurch her head up. Sakura kicked her hard in the stomach and lunged forward to punch her in the face to keep her back so they could stop. The woman wasn't fighting a fair battle; she kept going for Sakura's hair and she used her long, painted nails to scratch her. She however did get a good punch in right to Sakura's ribs which knocked the wind out of her. It was a hard blow.

Hot blood coursed through the makeup artist's system and traveled to her ears, deafening her from the cheers and yells of the crowd. "Cat fight" reverberated throughout the apartment, that much Sakura could hear. It was reiterated enough times for her to finally hear it in the haze of the fight. They grappled around on the floor trying to gain high ground. After abrading Sakura's pale skin with the knives she called nails, the woman went in for another punch. The words "cat fight" were getting more recognition among the throng as it was acquiring more pitch and more voices. It was almost deafening now.

Sakura wasn't new to girlish brawls; she had ruffled enough feathers in her life to know to handle herself in the midst of one. That's when Sasuke emerged behind the woman assaulting her, Sakura yelled at him not to interfere and to step back. Itachi quickly hastened to them as well, and Sasuke gave him a knowing look, silently conveying what Sakura had said to him to his brother. But Itachi still reached out a hand for Sakura and Sasuke shoved it back.

It was a weird circumstance to appreciate Sasuke, but Sakura did. They shared the same winning vanity. They didn't need anyone to fight their battles.

The siblings lunged back when the females grappled on the floor towards them. Once they finally ascended to a standing posture, the woman pushed Sakura back into an yellow inflatable pool that she hadn't noticed before being submerged in water. Sakura ingested water because of the shock. She had been caught off guard and now the woman was on top of her and Sakura was choking, trying to get the unwelcome liquid out of her system to end the fight once and for all. She was going to aim for the dilapidated parts of her face.

Even though fighting brought out an animalistic, carnivorous side in her, Sakura was still sympathetic to her opponent. The bruises on the woman's face looked so tender and agonizing that Sakura honestly didn't even want to come into contact with them, much less cause that much more pain to the woman. She never played dirty and didn't even think about pulling the woman's hair or scratching her, so this is what she resorted to. She had been purposefully not been directing her attacks on that portion of her body. After hacking the water out of her trachea, Sakura enacted the death blow.

Water might have played a small role in softening the full impact of Sakura's strike but it definitely committed the destruction she had planned it to. They had been wrestling in the shallow water, thrashing around for a few seconds until Sakura got a clear shot of the area she wanted to welt. It was optimal to clout the space between her nose and right eye, as that was part that looked the most wounded. So when they both stood up simultaneously, through the mist of liquid particles and smeared makeup and fake eyelashes, Sakura upthrust her small fist, cored all of her impetus into it, and threw it.

It was such a firm, impenetrable blow that it hammered the woman out of the small pool onto the floor again. Undoubtedly she was inert. Sakura extracted herself from the water to scrutinize her state and to get somebody to call an ambulance. It didn't occur to her that the room was bereft of any shouts or noise now. She looked around for the first time and was met with dumbfounded stares of awe.

It seemed like the Uchiha sibling's roles were interchanged tonight; Itachi was the one who later phoned the ambulance and Sasuke was the one who tended to her scuffs and rib bruising. Sakura couldn't see Sasuke's threatening glances towards Itachi when Itachi was the first to try to help her.

Sasuke waved away Ino and Suigetsu, and all of the others attempting to get to her. The next hours of the evening were a muddle for Sakura, she was tired and bewildered at what had just transpired. Though the things she could remember after the fight were vivid and kind of nice.

She had been carried up to Sasuke's room by him so they could escape any further injury- there was a lot of trampling going on, and many people were drunk and could cause more damage to Sakura- and so that Sasuke could access the medicinal cabinet in his personal bathroom. As a performer who conducts parlous moves, Sasuke was no stranger to physical trauma. He had seen his fair share of bruised ribs and lesions, just as Sakura had seen her fair share of fights. She was instructed to put on some dry clothes as he needed a dry area to work with. He placed her on his bed after handing her some painkillers.

They were his clothes and they smelled clean. He had helped her get them on and covered his eyes for her. It was a large, airy t shirt with his team number and name on it in bold print, and some of his usual black joggers.

Sasuke wordlessly applied some sort of cream on the nail made lacerations and asked Sakura if she could lift her shirt up so he could access the injury on her rib cage. He was considerate (as considerate as that boy could be) while going about the appliance of whatever he was doing. Gentle, even. It was atypical of Sasuke and Sakura suspected something was up. It hurt to speak so Sakura settled on whispering quietly.

"Why the humanitarian treatment? I could do these things myself," Sakura struggled to get out. Sasuke went up from her ribs to smoothed out the blots of cream on her collarbones, dipping in the crevice the bones created to get the ones she couldn't see. They would pop up later if he didn't maintain them right now.

"You can barely even talk," Sasuke countered. After he finished with the spread he went back down to the cracked ribs.

"Even if that was true, my first sentence definitely still stands."

Sasuke pressed ice hard down on the ribs which caused Sakura to flinch. He didn't make eye contact with her throughout the duration of their conversation. He seemed to be avoiding something.

"It's not kind treatment, I just owe you something."

Sakura leaned up and he put an index finger on the middle of her chest, gently putting her back down. She settled of resting on an elbow so she could look at his face better. Though Sasuke's face never gave away anything, there were flashes of some kind of emotion that supervened quickly across it sometimes. She waited for him to recommence. There was obviously more to the story.

"I'm not stupid, Sakura. And you couldn't have possibly bought into the story Gaara and my brother conjured up with about how we ended up in this bed together."

Sakura nodded and tilted her head. Sasuke appeared to have an inward brawl with his brain over the words he was going to choose next because he hadn't moved the ice on her ribs.

"I've been throwing up every day since that night. No matter how bad your alcohol poisoning is, that shit doesn't happen. My body has been rejecting whatever was put in my system since then. The alcohol was mixed with something."

"I was roofied, and when that mixes with alcohol, it messes up your body bad."

Sasuke started to move the ice around on her ribs again, pressing hard in the spots that were more discolored than the others.

"You were the one to find me."

Sasuke still wasn't looking at Sakura. His hand outstretched to his nightstand to grab the roll of gauze. He was going to bind her.

"And I presumably passed out, right? And that woman was the one who drugged you?"

Sasuke nodded.

"And I was the one who made those bruises on that woman's face?"

He nodded again.

In wonted circumstances, if Sakura had been fully sane and competent, she would have rubbed it in his face that he _did_ need someone there for him. But she was riding an adrenaline high still and settled for silence while Sasuke propped her up and binded her with soft, tight gauze. Sasuke ran his fingers through his hair and looked up at the ceiling after the deed was completed. Sakura opened her mouth once more time again for that night and drifted off to sleep afterwards.

Something between them that night changed, and it affected everything onward. The event was eye opening.

"Technically you still owe me; if it weren't for you, none of this would have happened."

Sasuke mumbled something that her comatose ears couldn't decipher, and he let her sleep while he put everything back.

"That was one hell of a punch, Sakura. Maybe I'll get into trouble more often, now."

 _Author's Note: yayyy i'm back after like a what, two month hiatus? i made sure to make it the longest, so please forgive me. enjoy~~~~~~~~_


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